To do the windows, use the tip of your brush to paint a rectangle in one stroke.
What’s the Difference Between Oil Painting and Acrylic Painting?
When you first start out painting, one of the initial decisions to make is not what you will paint, but what you will paint with. Three of the most common paint choices are watercolours, oil or acrylic paint. Distinguishing between watercolours and the latter two is relatively easy, but what about oil paints and acrylic paints? What are the differences and how do they affect the final result on canvas?
The Differences and a Brief History
If you were to squeeze both of these paints out of their respective tubes, it would be hard to tell which is oil and which is acrylic.
However, the makeup of these paints is rather different. The chemical composition of oil paints was developed in the 12 th century and includes pigments suspended in oil, most often linseed oil. The composition is not compatible with any water. Instead, white spirit or turpentine should be used to clean or thin the paints.
Acrylic paints are by far younger than oil paints and less than 100 years old. The pigments of this type of paint are suspended in acrylic polymer emulsion rather than linseed oil. This allows the paint to combine with water to be thinned, making them considered suitable for newcomers to painting.
The Outcomes on Canvas
Due to the difference in paint composition, the two types of paints also react differently when applied to a canvas. Oil paints can take days to fully dry while acrylics usually take just a few minutes. If you prefer to finish your paintings quickly, it is much better to use acrylic paints. However, realistic paintings usually work better with oil paints.
Another difference when on the canvas is the lightfast of these paints. Lightfast is a word that refers to how well the paints hold up when exposed to natural light over a long period. Oil paintings are not as resilient against natural light as acrylic paintings. This is why many older paintings look faded and need touch-ups. On the other hand, acrylic paintings have exceptional lightfast.
Materials Needed
Yield: One 11 x 14 Canvas
Learn to paint a cityscape with fall trees and reflecting water.
Active Time 2 hours
Total Time 2 hours
Difficulty Easy, Medium
- 11 x 14 Canvas
- Acrylic Paints
- Brushes
- Ruler (preferable a t-square)
- Pencil
Brushes
- 3/8″ or 1/4″ flat brush or something similar (smaller flats will be helpful for the windows in this painting!)
- 3/4″ wash brush
- #4 round brush
- round bristle brush
Colors
- titanium white
- mars black
- naphthol crimson (or any red!)
- primary yellow
- cerulean blue
- burnt umber
© Tracie Kiernan All Rights Reserved
Project Type: Acrylic Painting / Category: Fall
Download Tutorial
You can find the download for this tutorial in my PDF shop! Individual tutorial downloads are only $5 and includes the ability to download the video. This tutorial will have bonus traceables in this download bundle soon!
Color Palette
I used Liquitex BASICS acrylics to paint this scene! If you are using different paints, use the color chart below to try to match your colors.
