The technique of beginning a painting by blending white into the background can pose many problems, however if done correctly, it can produce beautiful effects.
Golden Acrylic Paint Manufacture doesn’t create mixing white. So, if you are a Golden fan, there has to be away around this…. Ah, yes, use some gesso and water, with a touch of glazing medium. This will blend without lightening the colors too much. Much of the time, you are just blending distant trees for landscapes with this technique.
In order to do this technique without complaint, spray the canvas with an atomizer, and load your brush with gesso and a bit of acrylic glazing medium and crisscross the brush across the top of the canvas, gradually getting less and less toward the end of the canvas.
It should stay wet for at least a half hour in more moist areas, like Oregon, and about 15 minutes in dry areas like Southern California.

Too many artists and teachers say you should only paint for yourself. Their reasons for this all differ. I don’t agree with most of their reasons. I think it is extremely selfish. I believe you should paint for the world beyond yourself, to affect others in a positive way. When you paint for other people, you are in affect painting for yourself too. To paint for others doesn’t mean painting pretty pictures to please others, especially images you don’t like. I mean paint for others in the only way you know how. Doing this IS good enough, regardless of where your skills are in the art of painting, and people will take notice of your work, and will appreciate you for it. If you are giving your all to your painting, and you feel that it will affect people positively, that is what I mean by painting for the world beyond yourself. Paint for the world, because your paintings touch other people, and your paintings may outlive you.

The technique of beginning a painting by blending white into the background can pose many problems, however if done correctly, it can produce beautiful effects.
Golden Acrylic Paint Manufacture doesn’t create mixing white. So, if you are a Golden fan, there has to be away around this…. Ah, yes, use some gesso and water, with a touch of glazing medium. This will blend without lightening the colors too much. Much of the time, you are just blending distant trees for landscapes with this technique.
In order to do this technique without complaint, spray the canvas with an atomizer, and load your brush with gesso and a bit of acrylic glazing medium and crisscross the brush across the top of the canvas, gradually getting less and less toward the end of the canvas.
It should stay wet for at least a half hour in more moist areas, like Oregon, and about 15 minutes in dry areas like Southern California.

I began this online journal for online reference for me, and to benefit my friends who are also artists. I also did it for my <a href=”http://www.learnacrylics.com”>Learn Acrylics In Five Days</a>, which is a free online workshop for acrylic painters. There are so many different beginning “how to” paint in acrylics out there, but very much lacking in the department afterwards. I still feel strongly about this. If you do not see very much “how to paint a cheese grater”, that’s why. I’m here to talk about the more advanced painting, such as color mixing, Notan, composition, design, emotional content, and how to put it all together using acrylic paint. You can read many books on advanced oil and watercolor paints, but how many have you read about acrylics? Chances are, maybe a pitiful one. Acrylics cannot be applied like oils or watercolors. I struggled for years trying to figure it all out by reading oil painting books. It was impossible, and teachers were pathetic. This medium has been around since the 1920s, and has been considered an art since the 1950s. There needs to be better information out here by now…. <a href=”http://www.learnacrylics.com”>Learn Acrylics</a>!!!
Cheers!

Looking past the first splats of paint can be difficult if you are new to painting. You look at the picture right in front of you and see chicken scratches, or dabs of nonsensical colors. The object of the game is to have a sense of what it should look like at the end of the game. Keep that vision in mind. This is the most important thing.
So, how do you concentrate on an image in your head for hours upon hours, and staring at something that looks completely different? Welcome to art. I would like to say there is a formula, but there really isn’t because everybody is different. However, there are exercises you can do in order to hold the image a bit longer in your head. One is to make thumbnail sketches to reference. This gives you an idea of what you first intended, and usually recaptures the “ah ha, that’s it” factor. Then there is staring at something for a few minutes, then doing practice sketches without looking at the object. See how closely you can get the object correct.
The beauty of art, is that every artist does it differently. Have you ever watched another artist paint, and kept saying to yourself “no! that’s not it, don’t do that! It’s wrong, EEEEK NOT THAT COLOR!!” This is an awesome thing, it gives you taste and uniqueness as an artist.

Ordinarily, I do not use naughty words, but in this situation, it works very well.
Many artists do not realize that when painting, true feelings and insecurities show in the work like a sore thumb. It is a fact. I was visiting a fellow artist yesterday and was looking through her art work. She had many paintings and most were very good. She was having mental complexes and I was there to help her work through them.
There was one painting that caught my eye like a beacon. The painting was incomplete, but the best I’ve seen her do. I asked her if she said “f” it when she was painting that piece. She said yes, at the time she felt relaxed and didn’t care about the outcome of that painting. I showed her how her lines of this particular piece was absolutely perfect compared to her other works and how the colors harmonized. I then showed her several of her prized pieces where I could see major anxiety in her attempt at perfectionism. The lines of those pieces were jagged, there were feeling of constriction, and her colors were unharmonious. When she saw this she was amazed.
When you approach your own work, you too should have an “f” it mentality, because it puts you into a state of relaxation, and this will enable you to produce better paintings. I saw this in my own work, which is why it was easy for me to see it in her art as well. Most of my strive-for-perfection paintings I threw away because they were not high quality as my own “f” it paintings.

When 10 people create a taco with five or more ingredients, you get 10 different tacos. Each person will choose which ingredients they like, and discard the rest. And even more diverse is how the amount of each ingredient used. Now imagine how unique the artist’s palette truly is. Artist’s have a minimum of 40 color choices from any one paint manufacturer. Each artist meditatively pick colors and put them into their paint boxes. A very select personal color range. Even when an artist has the same color choices as a fellow artist, they will mix the colors differently, add more of one color and less of another. It is an amazing, beautiful personal trait to observe in any artist.

Colors, colors, colors. Paint in the morning, paint before lunch, paint before bed. Color is all I think about much of the time. My uncle-in-law made me a sewing basket several years ago, and I use it daily. It is perfect for picking and choosing vibrant colors to play with in the morning, similar to picking out clothes to wear for the day. It is like a little color closet. Ah yes, fall, perhaps earthy colors to make pretty leaves, Pyrrole Red, Hansa Yellow Opaque, Burnt Umber and Sienna, Chromium Oxide Green and Anthraquinone Blue?…. Or perhaps a bright palette to cheer up this dreary foggy day, like Hansa Yellow Light, Phthalo Blue, Phthalo Green, Quinacridone Red… Soooo many choices! Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee :~)

I hear constantly of artists beating themselves to a pulp with negative words. This is a downward spiral to which I am not immune. However, I’ve learned to deal with the good and bad. Oh and believe me it takes effort if you have a big ego.
How would you feel (as a hard working artist) upon discovering a young artist fresh out of art school, who has bigger and better paintings than you do? You three choices in this situation. 1. Be pissed off and say “I suck, I’m going to throw away all my brushes….(not an option really).” 2. Nitpick the hell out of the person and/or their work… 3. Do something more constructive….. “He is great!”
By choosing the more positive response in that situation, the subconscious mind reads great artists get praise. Therefore, being a successful artist imprints a positive image. Basically, do unto others as others do unto you is not just an old adage. It works. If you beat others up mentally, you are more likely to beat yourself up, as well as imprint a negative image towards successful artists. A perfect example is beating up Thomas Kinkade…. Come on, I know you heard other artists speak of him right? “He’s too this, he’s too that, he sucks.” What sucks about him the most? That he has his own cloying little gallery in every town in America? He’s a household name? He is happy due to the fact he makes his living from painting? Oh, for shame! You wouldn’t want that for yourself would you? To be well known, make a living off of art or have a gallery in every town? Nah, you couldn’t want that…. right? (Sarcasm alert.)
Focus on the positive.
It is not enough to say this person is great, you need to mean it. Why did this particular artist grab you so much? What was it about the work? Was it the colors, the technique, the subject matter? Was it the artist’s good sense of marketing, manner, professionalism? All of the above? If it was all of the above, which was the one that grabbed you first? Focusing on the positive works even on art that is of questionable quality. Admire the artist’s marketing skills that managed to fool the art curator to get the art in!
By focusing on the good stuff about a successful artist, gives your mind a positive image of success. Ultimately, in doing so builds your confidence and self esteem.

From trial and error I found a palette that works time and time again. I recommend these colors to anyone who is just starting to paint. For other colors like Chromium Oxide Green and Yellow Ochre, please see the Auxiliary palette post.
Note: My palette colors are Golden Acrylics, Winsor & Newton Artist Oils, and Winsor & Newton Watercolors and sometimes Gamblin OIls.
Titanium White PW6 is pigment Titanium Dioxide Rutile which gives great solid covering power, which gets used often to cover up mistakes more than color mixing, so get a big tube, tee hee.
• Mars Black PBk11 made of synthetic black iron oxide. This is the least used color on my palette, but it is nice to have around. It can be either go either way with permanent or auxiliary palettes, but leaned for permanent as I think a black is needed like a dash of pepper is needed in mashed potatoes.
• Red Oxide PR101 is a deep red made of synthetic red iron oxide. I use this instead of Burnt Umber, because you can mix a Burnt Umber with red oxide and Ultramarine blue, as well as a Burnt Sienna with a bit of Hansa Yellow.
• Hansa Yellow Opaque PY74 is made with Arylide Yellow 5GX, which is a warm yellow, or yellow that leans towards orange. This is a nontoxic pigment that replaces Cadmium Yellow Light. This color will produce duller earthy greens when mixed with blues. It will create vibrant oranges, ochres and other orange earth colors when mixed with red and violet. Yellow and Pyrrole Red Light can produce normal to vibrant reds and oranges.
• Hansa Yellow Light PY3 is made with Arylide Yellow. This pigment is a yellow green, which mixed with phthalo green will produce very bright cheery greens. This pigment is used to lighten up Hansa Yellow Opaque without the use of Titanium White to make a classic yellow.
• Pyrrole Red Light PR255 is Dipyrrolopyrrol. This is a nontoxic pigment that replaces Cadmium Red Light. This is the second least used color on my palette. This is a brilliant red that can be tamed and turned to a very dark brown with a touch of Phthalocyanine Green. When mixed with Hansa Yellow Opaque, this red will produce vibrant oranges. A classic lipstick red is produced when mixed with Quinacridone Violet.
• Quinacridone Violet PV19 is a beautiful cool red that produces brilliant violets when mixed with Ultramarine Blue and Titanium White. It’s warmers are Hansa Yellow Opaque and Pyrrole Red Light.
• Ultramarine Blue PB29 is one of the most used colors on the palette. It is a blue that leans towards red, so it makes brilliant violets when mixed with Quinacridone Violet and produces dull greens and grays when mixed with Phthalo green.
• Phthalocyanine Blue PB15:4 (also called pthalo blue) is a beautiful rich blue that leans towards green, created with copper phthalocyanine. It has a high pigment load, thus will dominate the other colors, so treat it as you would a black or dark gray when mixing.
• Phthalocyanine Green PG7 is the only green you cannot mix with any other color. It is created with chlorinated copper phthalocyanine. This produces bright greens when mixed with a bit of yellow and sea greens when mixed with white. Also called pthalo green, it can be darkened with Cadmium Red or Quinacridone Violet to produce dark greens, grays and blacks.
• Be sure to get the correct numbers, as names of colors differ from brand to brand.
Blue, red and violet produces a variety of shades of purple, violet and magenta.
Mixtures of green, yellow, blue and burnt umber produce a variety of greens. Burnt umber darkens the greens as well as red.
The yellow leans more toward red, so it mixes great oranges and ochres when mixed with red and violet. If you use white with mix, expect shades of pinks and peaches.
To produce a beautiful sky blue use blue, a touch of green and a plethora of white.
Blacks and dark grays can be mixed by mixing any opposite colors. My favorite black mixtures are brown and blue or green, and red or violet and green.
If you simply can’t afford or have room for the above palette, but want a nice range of colors to mix some reds, oranges, greens, violets, dark browns, get these:
Titanium White
Hansa Yellow Light
Pyrrole Red Light
Quinacridone Violet
Ultramarine Blue
Phthalocyanine Blue