Fall 2017 Acrylic Class

Acrylic Class Project: A Fall Proposal Week 5

This week was more of a fine tuning week before we get into doing the details and finishing up our project. Never be afraid to make changes or improvements to your painting, if you see something that bothers you go in and fix it. We are working with paint not stone, fixes are a lot easier. this week I did several fixes and adjustments.

The first adjustment I did was on the paper around the bouquet. When I looked at it at home it looked too pink and I needed more shadows on the paper behind the bottle.

First, I took my #6 flat bristle brush and a mix of napthol with a little orange (you can use cad red light and orange as well) and water to thin it so it is very washy looking, then with a very dry brush (little water and little paint, remember to squeeze the back end of the brush with your paper towel) using small circles and very light pressure on my brush, I did a dry brush glaze over the whole paper area to give it a redder look but not lose some of the pinkish look. I also did a similar thing with a mix of ultramarine blue and alizarin  to shade the back part of the  paper that goes off the canvas to fade it out.

Another place I used this dry brush technique is putting a lavender reflected light on the bottle with my #4 bristle brush. 

Practice this technique because it is very useful in acrylic. It should look almost transparent when you put it on, just hitting some of the tops of the canvas threads, if it is too solid looking you are pressing too hard, if it looks blotchy or runny, you have too much water on your brush, make sure after you rinse your brush you dry it and after you pick up the paint squeeze the back end of the brush to get out excess water you picked up when loading your brush.

 The next fix I did was to change the shape of the lower rose petal. I thought it was too long and the wrong shape so I took my #6 flat SABLE brush and a mix of blue, alizarin and a touch of green to make a dark green shadow color and used that color to reshape the petal and add another leaf in the process. To make the outside edge of the leaf, I added a bit of white to the mix, just enough to make it lighter but not bright light.

You do not need to go through the whole process of painting out something that needs fixing, just fix it but remember to make the fix look like it is part of the  painting, not just some random stripe or blotch.

I also fixed the bulge in the ring box using a dark mix of blue, alizarin with the bristle brush this time so I could scrub in the color to reshape the the box. Again, I didn't just make a stripe of color, I used the dry brush technique, scrubbed in the color around the box and also out away from the box. Once I have the shape the way I liked it I added some napthol and touches of orange to get the light back into the fabric working those colors in by scrubbing the color in and blending it with what is already there. It is important you learn to fix things so they look like they were always like that, you will be happier with your paintings.

Still more fixing and adjusting. I had made the petals on the red flower too long and too bright so this was a 2 part fix. First I took the #4 bristle brush and dark colors - blue, alizarin, sometimes I added green if I was on a leaf - and I reshaped the petals by painting in the dark around them. All of these fixes are what is called "negative painting" meaning you are painting the space AROUND something not the thing itself. With this fix I am changing the shape of the petals by changing and adding shadows. Remember to blend the fixes out into the surrounding area so they look like they were always there. The second part of the flower fix I did with my sable brush and a mix of napthol and alizarin trying not to make the petals longer again but to clean up the edges and darken the bright red color I had at the tips.

Another thing I did here was to add shapes to the hydrangea to make it look like it had flowers. Funny thing about this is there are very few actual flower shapes in this cluster but because of the few that look like flowers the rest of the shapes suggest more flowers.

 I did a separate demo to show how just adding a few shapes that look like flowers and the rest are just marks, tricks the viewer into thinking that there are a bunch of flowers, even the center dots add to the illusion. I was using the sable brush, with blue for the base then adding white for lighter colors or alizarin for those "flowers" that were in shadow. Blue and burnt sienna or umber for the very dark centers.

This is where I left off on Monday and I am thinking I could possible finish this in our next class, don't worry if you are not as far along we still have 3 more weeks so take you time just keep painting and I will see you in class.

Fall 2017 Acrylic Class

Acrylic Class Project: A Fall Proposal Weeks 3 and 4

Week 3 I started adding the flowers and this time I was using my flat sable brushes. You can get similar effects with round brushes but practice first.

Think about what you are painting and the shape you are trying to make. flower petals at both ends are rounded and narrow but fatter in the middle, by using the end of the brush, twisting, pushing and lifting you can make the shape of the petals so you don't get straight pointed skinny petals. The petals are also a bit curved as the go into the centers of the flowers.

Change the colors of red like you did with the background and box by adding orange or blue to brighten or darken the color. the centers are burnt sienna and blue and don't make them just round and smooth the edges are ragged.

This is the under painting for the sunflowers, I will do more later. The technique is the same as for the rend flower, notice the different angles the flowers face, you don't want them looking in the same direction.

Withe brighter colors I started to define the leaf shapes though most of those are only parts of leaves. I also added some dark between leaves to separate and also help define the leaf shapes.

I didn't work on the roses yet, but I did work around the roses to get dark areas around the roses. Remember if you want to show light you need to have dark around it for the contrast. I used the dark colors to define the petals of the rose as well as separate  leaves from each other.

This is where I left off on week 3, I have most of my under painting in for everything in my painting, the next week I will start refining these elements by adding intermediate highlights along with shadows and some detail.

Week 4. this is what happens when you are trying to explain what you are doing and trying to paint at the same time. I am not happy with the highlighting I did on my red flower because I got it too light and I got some of the petals too long, I will fix this in class so you can see what I do. It is always helpful to know how to get yourself out of a problem or to change something without completely painting it out.

To the yellow sunflowers I added a bit of orange with red to cut down on the bright yellow but leaving some of the yellow as highlights. I was using the flat sable again with a similar stroke, just not as long.

While the roses are looking more white, they are still not pure white and they never will be. I mixed gesso with a little tint of yellow. It take surprisingly little yellow to tint the gesso so be careful when you pick up the yellow.

With the sable brush and looking carefully at the photo, starting at the outside edge of a petal, I added this lighter color where I see in the photo the light areas on the rose, then smudging the edge that goes into the center of the rose with my finger to blend it into the under painting (the blush of pink was because I had red paint on my fingers when I did this, happy accident).

Don't cover up all of the under painting because this now becomes the shadows on the rose. use the corners of the brush to do the centers and smaller petals and work your way around the rose. You might want to practice.

I continued on the paper wrapping adding highlights and shadows. some of the medium shadows are pure reds while the paper that gets light has a touch or white in it just don't let it get too pink. Again, look at the photo or get some tissue paper and wrap it around something to see how the wrinkles form before you try to paint them.

The bottle was done by using blue, alizarin, Hooker's green and touches of white. Use a bristle brush for the bottle. The darker  part was the blue and alizarin (before the label was added), dry brush blending the colors together, then adding the green around the outside edges with touches of white (teeny, tiny touches of white), blending these colors on the bottle itself using the dry brush technique and follow the shape of the bottle as you blend.

The cap was Hooker's, a touch of white and blue to darken, again dry brush blending on the canvas.

The highlights are a little blue, green and a touch of gesso, very dry brush, then start in the center and with very little pressure on the brush, make tiny circles and move out from the center, losing pressure on the brush as you go. You may need to do this a couple of times and also practice. If you press too hard it will look too solid.

The label was a mic of yellow, sienna, gesso and blue. It is darker near the red paper and lighter as it come into the light.

I keep brightening the little box using the napthol and orange in the brighter areas, alizarin and blue in the shadow areas, a bristle brush and the dry brush technique, scrubbing in the color to create soft blended edges which gives it the velvet look.

I also brightened the fabric around the front of the box with napthol and touches of orange to bring focus to the box.

This is where we left off in our last class and should get you caught up with what we have been doing in class.

We (I) are getting close to wrapping this up in the next couple of weeks so I hope that you can get caught up to this point. We should have a week or two to finish before the end of the semester if you get behind.

Keep painting and I will see you in class.

Fall 2017 Acrylic Class

A Fall Proposal Week 2

Once the background was dry I sketched on my design with chalk. I used the chalk because the background is dark, charcoal would be hard to see.

What I did next was to under paint the elements of my design: The flowers, leaves, wine bottle, ring box and the paper around the bouquet.

For those new to acrylics or still struggling with how it works, the under painting is like the foundation of your painting, it is what we build on. We start out a bit on the dark side then work to the lightest lights and to the darkest darks, what you see here will change as the painting progresses but some of these colors become shadows or texture or variations of value, don't try to skip over this step or you paintings will look flat.

The under painting for the leaves of the bouquet are just a mishmash of color. I used every color on my palette and used my #6 bristle brush with the scumbling stroke (strokes going every which way) to create the background for my leaves. I was more interested in interesting shapes at this point and not  completely mixing the colors so when I was done the brush strokes made it look like there is a lot going on in the bouquet.

The red paper against the red background needs to be handled cautiously. The red needs to be different from the background red (Alizarin, napthol and ultramarine blue) so it will stand out so I used the napthol with a touch of orange for the brighter red and the alizarin and blue to darken or to create shadows.

One of the things you need to be careful of when going to lighten red, it is better to lighten with either orange or yellow because white will turn it pink. That said, I did use a tiny amount of gesso (white) to slightly lighten the paper color because if you look at the photo you will see in front of the bottle the paper is slightly pink. Just be careful you do not add too much white or you will have to try again.

The bottle was a mix of my ultramarine blue, alizarin and Hooker's green with tiny touches of gesso on the right side. I worked wet into wet to blend.

The ring box had the same problem as the paper so I did a similar thing using orange to lighten the napthol red but no white this time. I used alizarin and UM blue for the shadows, gently blending wet into wet to give a soft rounded look to the edges of the box.

Always keep min mind the shape of the thing you are painting and follow the curves and remember that pressure is a big part of your brush stroke, very little pressure on the brush to blend.

Yes, I know that they are suppose to be white roses not lavender ones but this is how you start out painting things that are white with a blue or lavender under painting.

I used gesso (white) with touches of UM blue and purple or alizarin. to make it lighter you add more white to make it darker more blue and alizarin. I was still using my bristle brush pulling it from the outside edge of a petal in towards the center of the rose. The center of the rose was made with the end of the bristles turning it to create curves and the corners of the brush for the very center.

While I had that light blue color on my brush, I just made some loose leaf shapes that will be the sliver dollar leaves near the background. Please note that these are just shapes, nothing more at this point.

Finally, to that same blue color I added a touch of green and a bit more of the blue for the under painting of the hydrangea. Add white to make it lighter more blue and green to make it darker. Again this is just scumbling and creating an interesting edge around where the flowers will be.

I hope that most of you have your paintings to this point when we meet in class, we still have the under painting of a few flowers before we begin the detailing which I hope to start once we finish the under painting.




So keep painting and I will see you in class.