I've never done much painting in my life but recently decided to try some oil painting. I found it relaxing and enjoyable. I was tolerably happy with how a cloudy sky came out in my first painting, but I also tried to paint the sea and a ship and neither of them were fit for public viewing. If any of you are experienced with oil paints, can you recommend tutorials or even basic introductions that you think are good. We're talking very basic, beginner-level materials. Thanks, all!
I've done a little painting, in oil, acrylic, watercolor, and a few more media, but I never got very good at any of them. I didn't get decent results until I went to digital really. Well, I got better results from some color drawing media, in particular pastels, oil pastels and watercolor pencils. I could never get used to handling a brush. I'm so used to a pencil or drawing media, where if you press harder the mark gets darker. Never works in painting! A few questions—have you learned any drawing yet? Really drawing is step one. You want to learn to represent three dimensions on a flat 2D surface (assuming you're wanting to work realistically or somewhat close) and how to do lighting and shading before you bring in all the added complexity of color and brush handling. That can best be learned in pencil or something similar. I've always found pencil the easiest and most satistying of all drawing meda. My only problem with it is that it doesn't go all the way to black, only sort of a medium gray, and it glares if you try to take a picture or scan it. But for learning I consider it the best. I can think in pencil, and there aren't many other media I can do that in. It would also help to know what kind of painting you want to do. I mean, realistic, cartoony, anime, (I'm assuming not abstract).
Good questions, @Xoic I haven't done much with drawing. I was drawn to painting primarily because the few times I'd done painting in the past (which wasn't with oils) I found it relaxing. I haven't learned any real theory, whether of drawing, painting, or what have you. I think I'd enjoy drawing as well. I also have an iPad and Apple Pencil. I haven't tried to use them for art, so I don't know if it would have the same feel in terms of a relaxing hobby to have, in addition to my writing. The painting I tried over the weekend was supposed to be realistic. I don't think cartoony or anime would be the thing for me. I like impressionist/expressionist works. I don't know that I'd rule out abstract art, though I'm not sure I have the artistic insight I think you'd need to work in that area. I do like geometric shapes, symmetry etc.
Ok, it sounds like you want to paint as recreation, rather than become an artist. There are ways that don't involve learning perspective and shading etc. I don't know nearly as much about that kind of painting, but I can probably help you find some tutorials or something. I suppose a good way to go would be to learn how to transfer an image onto a canvas accurately and then paint it. That way you can bypass all the technical drawing stuff. There are a few methods for transferring an image. One is to lay transparent graph paper over the picture and draw a light grid on your canvas (probably in light vine charcoal, that can easily be brushed off later without leaving a trace) and then you can draw a really accurate copy of the image. Let me see if I can find a tutorial for that.
Here: How to Transfer an Image to the Canvas She shows I think two ways to do it. As with everything, computers make it a lot easier than when I learned the old-fashioned ways lol! Looks like some good advice.
Thank you, @Xoic -- I will certainly take a look at that. I didn't even think about using pencil or charcoal to first put the image on the canvas!
Here's the other method you might want to look into. There are different models of projectors for this. I have a really good flatbed one and a small one that will only take images like the size of a playing card or so, that sits on top like the one in the video.
If you do use charcoal it's traditional to brush it off with a feather, but a really soft brush like a makeup brush will work nicely too, or just a crumpled up kleenex or something. Try not to scrub against it though, it will rub it in rather than lift it. Light touch.
Oh, in the last video, with the tracing projector. Notice they couldn't quite fit the whole image, and had to only draw the face? You can make the image smaller on the computer, print it up, and then put it under the tracer. I used to do that all the time when I was doing airbrushed t-shirts. Heck, by now they've probably got one that plugs into the computer using USB or something, so you can project straight from the computer. Like many things we only dreamed about at one time, it may well be a reality now.
For drawing I find real pencil far better than any kind of digital substitute. Trying to draw on the surface of a tablet is like drawing on a piece of glass. It needs to be like paper instead, with some texture and some tooth to it. I also just can't get used to drawing down in front of me while the image is showing up on the monitor. That doesn't bother me in painting though, it's weird. But when I get to the painting stage I already have the drawing done. I do it in pencil usually and take a picture, using a few tricks to reduce glare and get good even lighting. Then the drawing becomes the surface I digitally paint onto. This might not be the case for you or other people though. I was used to drawing having a particular feel and resistance of the pencil point against the paper, so it was hard to adjust. If you start off drawing on a tablet it might might work really well for you. You can see some of my drawings here: Drawings @ Flickr Paintings here: Paintings @ Flickr And my art blog: Artventure @ Blogspot
