Thinking about taking up painting - advice?

Oriel

Hi Folks,
I'm thinking about taking up painting. I'm not sure where to start!
Any pointers?

Cheers,
Steve.

Andrewf20

I started painting in 1995 for my junior cert and am still painting to this day. -Like anything, practise is key. I was quite poor at it but after 3 years (about 75 paintings), I got to 90% of the level that Im at today.

What stuff are you thinking of painting. Landscapes, portraits, technical drawings? I can give some advice on some things, but let us know what you would be painting for more useable info for you?

Heres some of my work. Im up to speed with technical and landscape paintings.

http://bmwmovies.net/displayimage.php?pid=1305&fullsize=1
http://bmwmovies.net/displayimage.php?pid=1568&fullsize=1

Lucas10101

You have been painting since 1995....12 years....so I expected to see some half decent pictures from you...but I wasn't that impressed by the images you have showed. Those images are obviously your worst works...can you upload your best, I'd like to see it. Don't get me wrong, the pictures aren't bad at all, I just expected a higher standard.

Andrewf20

Heres 2 more recent ones...

Lucas10101, suggestions for improvement welcome.

Lucas10101

Yeah, their definitely better and more realistic looking alright. If I were to complain, it would be the lack of background in the first image you showed there. I also think that the second one depicts the atmosphere quite well...not that I'm an expert, but it's my opinion anyhow.

Andrewf20

No worries. I have only done 3 or 4 painting with no background, the rest are fully loaded. You need to see my first painting, its woeful. I have all my paintings archive in jpeg at home. Ill try and post it soon.

mike65

I have a copy of Paint Along With Nancy Kominsky if you want it!

Mike.

Oriel

Ooh replies! Well, I guess I would be thinking about landscapes first and foremost, if I could get somewhat decent at those, then I'd see from there!

Andrewf20

Okay, heres one thing to bare in mind in relation to landscapes. The further things are away, the more hazy they get, so dont focus on crazy detail on objects in the far distance. Also, mountains / objects in the distance tend to appear lighter in colour and can take on a blueish hint (usually) to a larger degree as they get further away from you. See these photos for example: http://news.azdailysun.com/images/bizdir/big/1475.jpg
http://www.atpm.com/6.07/national-parks/images/grand-teton-mountains.jpg.

I find that for easy skys, use lots of water and just give a light hint of white and blue paint to give a light wash of paint over the paper. Use a big brush for this and you will get a simple but effective sky scape. Spread out the water as best you can. Pools of water on the page look messy.

For trees, I build up the trees in layers, so I usually cover the same area of paper 3-4 for times, each time, with a different level of darkness in green & yellow green, black etc. This gives a bit of depth to the foliage. You can see how I have a applied these principles to the paintings attached. The mountains in the 1984 pic are hazy, lacking details as above, but are a bit crummy, so I have modified them since, but you still get the idea.

If you are completely new to painting, one thing to watch out for is having an unmanageable amount of water in the brush, so if you want to keep things neat and have good definition / accuracy, then for water based paints, dip brush in water, then dap it in tissue to take the bulk water out, then dip brush into paint, bring brush out of paint jar and with the slightly wet brush, spread it out on an paint board (some surface where you'll mix paints) to get the paint easy to flow. (Also, dont have a hugh amount of paint on the brush either.) I only ever have the brush a little moist unless doing sky. Water and thin paper dont go well together as the water ripples the paper, so I use 300millgram paper, which is basically thicker, like white cardboard so it doesnt ripple. Its in Easons, 27 bills for 12 sheets so its not hugely cheap. For years though I used regular paper and it disciplined me to use as little water as possible to reduce the rippling.

Another tip is that if you have a shaky hand, hold your breath while painting, as it steadys you a little more for those finer detail points.

Dont beat yourself up if you are struggling. It took me years to get to some level of decency. These things take time to develop.

Also, yellow+blue = green, red+blue = brown.

Let us know how you get on. Good luck!

Cazanne

I'm new here - and new to painting with acrylics - I found this helpful - especially as I am painting a vehicle!
Thanks to those who happily share their experiences

Andrewf20

Welcome Cazanne. Can I give you a great tip for doing vehicles?

I dont have the ability to accurately draw vehicles in 3D so I use this great technique. Get a decent sized picture of the car you are drawing (say half an A4 page sized pic), and accurately draw over the car a grid of boxes like in a maths copy and number each box across and down. See my attached picture of Senna at Monza in 1990 with the boxes added in. I usually make 1x1cm squares over the picture. Get the blank white paper and draw a grid of say 2x2 cm square (this effectively doubles the size of the original image), again number these, and then copy over each box at a time from the photo. Easy.

Look closely to see where I showed evidence of the boxes in this painting despite my best efforts to rub them out.
http://boards.ie/vbulletin/attachment.php?attachmentid=45260&d=1190538535

Usually the sun is the only source of light, so make sure that all you shadows fall in the same direction. Also, if you are doing a white car, use a little grey to darken up white regions of the car that ARE NOT in direct sunlight to make those white parts of the car ARE in direct sunlight stand out more. See my 1984 picture above to explain. Look closely at the the way the tops of the mirrors are brighter suggesting the shape that they are. It took me a while to work on shade & reflections but they are important.

Would love to see your work when its finished.

Good luck!

Oracle

mike65 wrote: »

I have a copy of Paint Along With Nancy Kominsky if you want it!

Mike.

I remember Nancy, I wonder how many people actually painted along with her.....:rolleyes: none I suspect!

experiMental

remember, the whole hobby of painting will cost you a lot financially...

eve23

Hi,
I took up oil painting about 4 years ago and love it, oils are very easy to work with as any mistakes can just be painted over! it can be a bit expensive so get started as tubes of paint are 3-4 euro each but they last ages- i still have tubes 4 years old. here is some of my work.

Andrewf20

Good work Eve. Reflections can be tricky and they are done well in the pic with the ducks. I like the moodiness of the 4th pic. My favourite of the 4.

Finally, see attached the 1st 2 paintings I ever did. Fairly scauldy, lets be honest.