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14 Encouraging Tips for Acrylic Painters
Creativity doesn’t come easy. . . it takes hard work and patience to make good work great. Luckily, with time comes experience and lately I think I have discovered a few things that have helped me improve as a painter.
I paint mostly in acrylic, because of its fast drying time, and have been painting every day for almost a year. As I look back upon some of my earlier work, I can see the progress I’ve made—so today I’d like to share with you some of the advice I’ve gleaned from the internet, other artists, and various resources.
My acrylic painting tips for new painters
(These first 9 tips should be helpful to any artist out there who is looking for encouragement and ways to improve.)
1. Constantly research art – Search the internet, check out other artist sites, read blogs and look at art, art, art.
2. Do your homework – Study paintings, notice the details, define what it is that appeals to you.
3. Get critiqued – There’s always room for improvement, and other artists may be able to see things you’re missing. Put your feelings aside and learn from them.
4. Study the golden ratio – Sometimes the best compositions are the simplest. The golden ratio has been used in art for centuries. Make sure every composition has a good foundation.
5. Make a rough draft – Take the time to do a value study before starting a painting.
6. Put aside time for your art – Set aside an hour or two every day (or at least a few times a week) to paint.
7. Get competitive – Join art challenges as often as possible. Here are a few that I have found helpful (and fun):
8. Make an investment – Purchase the highest quality materials and paints that you can and take care of them!
9. Never give up – Practice makes perfect!
(These next 5 tips are a little more specific, and may just be personal preference, but in the hopes that they’ll help you too, I’m including them as well.)
10. Get an atomizer spray bottle – I like to finely mist my acrylic paints while painting in order to prevent them from drying out.
11. Use a piece of glass for a palette – The one I use is approx 11×14. Glass is very durable, and often cheaper than a store-bought palette.
12. Always keep your brushes wet – I use two jars of water. The first is a quart jar with a plastic dish in the bottom for gently cleaning brushes. The second one is just for resting my brushes in while painting.
Important! Only put approx 1-1.5 inches of water in the 2nd jar so the silver part of the brush will be above the water level. This keeps the brush bristles from becoming loose and wobbly.
13. Store your paints with a wet sponge – I always place a small wet sponge in my Mastersons wet palette box. I place my glass palette inside and seal. This prevents the paint from drying out for several days.
14. Keep a razor blade handy – I use it as a paint scraper to scrape my palette clean. After a quick swipe with a wet paper towel, it’s good as new.
And really, whether you use these tips or not, the most important thing is to always remember to keep learning! If you do, you’re sure to improve.
GOLDEN Color Pouring Medium [CPM] extends acrylic paints for pouring. Either Matte or Gloss formulas may be mixed with most acrylic paints, although GOLDEN Fluid and High Flow colors are best suited for pouring. Here are some tips for successful color pours:
SUPPORT PREP
■ Use a smooth, rigid surface like an artist panel or canvas board (stretched canvas may sag under the weight of color pours).
■ Seal absorbent surfaces with a gloss acrylic medium to slow dry time for more uniform pours. Allow at least 24 hours for panels to dry before pouring.
WORK AREA
■ Prepare a clean and dry space on a level work surface with a protective cover for easy cleanup. Polyethylene plastic sheeting works well. (Plastic sheeting should allow you to peel up dry paint drippings to use in other artwork).
■ Elevate your painting with disposable cups or similar so pours can drip over the edge.
PREPARING PAINTS
■ Mix 10 parts CPM to 1 part acrylic color as a starting point. Use more paint to increase opacity or less for more transparent color.
■ Prepare mixtures ahead of time. Use clean, properly labeled containers and stir rather than shake mixtures to minimize foam and air bubbles. Mixtures with CPM Gloss should sit in sealed containers overnight to eliminate bubbles. This is not necessary for mixtures using CPM Matte
POURING
■ Use only a few colors to start with and see how they interact with each other.
■ Use our Pigment Density Chart to see the relative density of pigments, as this may affect the outcome of pours. justpaint.org/pigment-density
■ CPM Matte dries thinner than CPM Gloss. When CPM Gloss and Matte are used in a single pour, test first to become familiar with how this difference in thickness impacts your pour.
■ CPM Matte is heavier than CMP Gloss. When used together, gloss colors tend to cover matte colors – this is difficult to see when pouring because CPM Matte is glossy until it dries.
AFTER THE POUR
■ Loosely cover pours to reduce crazing and keep dust off the surface. Small paintings can be put in a clean box with a loose fitting lid. Larger paintings can be tented with plastic approximately 3” above the wet paint surface. Be careful to avoid touching the wet painting surface.
■ Allow pours to dry for 72 hours (longer is better) before moving or adding additional layers.
For additional information on GOLDEN Color Pouring Mediums, please read our Product Information Sheet at: goldenpaints.com/technicalinfo_colorpouring
Click to download pdf of this tip sheet
Advice for successful acrylic painting
by developer
Acrylics are easy to use and the famous muralist Diego Rivera is no exception. Diego used acrylic paints on a large scale because of its durability. Since the 1950s many artists have drawn inspiration from the old guards. The acrylics have become commercially available and increased in popularity. Suzi Nassif is a Lebanese born artist whose primary medium for her artwork is based on acrylics and oil. Suzi successfully uses layers of glazes in her paintings. The polymer-based paint dries faster than oil paint on canvas so most artist prefers to use it. Want to know more about acrylic painting techniques? Here are various ways and styles artists can work with acrylic paints.
Underpainting
The underpainting is a technique used to unite color values in the overall painting. Though simple it has a key influence on your overall painting. Before you start painting, thin the paint with a solvent to lift a bit. The artist needs to take precautions to avoid the risk of outer layers cracking or peeling as time moves.
Impasto painting technique has been in existence for many years. This technique tries to hide the fact that an artwork is painted. Impasto creates the impression of 3-dimensionality eliminating the evidence of an artist’s hand or brushstroke. An artist applies undiluted opaque paint like acrylic directly from the tube similar toothpaste onto a panel or canvas. You can as well use a brush or painting knife. Artists use impasto acrylic painting techniques to convey messages feelings and emotions. Jackson Pollock is an abstract expressionist who used the impasto technique.
Glazing
What is the secret to a successful glaze? Plan the composition and you can the colors before you begin painting, at the gesso stage. Use a smooth surface when painting to avoid a blotchy look. A liquid glazing medium is preferable not water when diluting the paint to help disperse the pigment evenly. In your mixture make the paint 10% and the glazing liquid at 90%. Even so, the amount of glaze you add to the paint depends on the color’s transparency. If you want to build transparent layers let each of the glaze layers be thin and leave to dry completely before applying the next layer.
How can an artist liven up the color blocks? In scumbling acrylic painting technique layers of broken colors are placed on top so that parts of the lower layer of the other color shows through the scumbling. The painter has to wait for the first color to dry up so the colors can’t mix.
Suzi Nassif is an award-winning acrylic artist who mirrors her views in her paintings. Besides she has drawn her experiences and journeys around the globe to produce phenomenal artwork. The contemporary artist has taken a range of abstraction to create her finished masterpieces. Her work reflects an excitement of discovery. As a result, her acrylic on canvas painting is high energy.
