Oil painting techniques are more complex (in terms of technology) and more expensive than using, for example, gouache, watercolors or pastels. Different visual means help the artist to embody different ideas. Oil paintings have their own character, given by texture, paints, writing technique and skill of the author.
It is necessary
Oil paints, primer, glue, fixer, palette, brushes (preferably flat and made of natural materials), palette knife, easel, pencil, eraser, tracing paper, carbon paper and other useful little things purchased by artists for the convenience of work
Instructions
Step 1
Buy a canvas. They are usually linen or cotton. Cotton canvas is cheaper and easier to handle. Linen can be fine-grained, suitable for prescribing small details, and coarse-grained, on which it is good to reflect the texture (for example, stones, the sea). Instead of traditional canvas, burlap, plywood, hardboard, metal are also used for working with oil. You can also use paper, but the painting will not be durable.
The cheaper canvas is the one stretched over cardboard. It is thin and easy to carry, no more than 0.5x0.7m in size. Canvas on a stretcher is more expensive and heavy, but larger - up to 1, 2x1, 5m.
Step 2
Along with the canvas, purchase all the necessary accessories: oil paints, primer, glue, fixer, palette, brushes, palette knife, easel. If you will be sketching on paper and then transferring it to canvas, you will need transparent paper (you can use tracing paper) and a carbon copy. Something else may come in handy in the process, so check with the seller.
Step 3
Glue and prime the canvas, then let it dry. This operation is done so that the paint does not destroy it and lies well on the canvas.
Step 4
Sketch with a pencil. If the writing technique is multi-layered, then the drawing must be fixed with a special tool, or covered with another layer of soil.
Step 5
Further, everything will depend on the technique of execution. If the painting is small, and the experience of creating paintings is still small, try the technique in one step (alla prima). This means that the painting should be finished in one or several passes, but in time before the paints dry. Drying time for oil paint is on average about 3 days, depending on the thickness of the layer. The picture will get those tones and colors that you create by mixing. Additional colors will be obtained due to the translucence of the soil. The painting itself will be lighter and brighter.
Step 6
Usually, artists use a multi-layered technique: it reveals all the possibilities of oil painting. Its essence is that the author of the painting divides his task into several subtasks, which he then implements in different layers. First, the first thin layer is created, called "underpainting". For its implementation, the paints are diluted. Underpainting helps define composition, tonality, shape, shadows and chiaroscuro.
Step 7
In the next layers, the artist step by step prescribes details, subtleties of form and color, texture. In the last layers, linseed oil is added to add saturation and color stability. After the paint has dried, it is varnished. The duration of this period depends on the thickness of the layers, and on average is 6-12 months.
