Acrylic Painting
- Emily Ray
- May 12, 2023
- 4 min read
One of my absolute favorite crafts to do is paint with acrylics! It's easy and forgiving and all around a great starting point for beginners. I've painted on and off throughout the years, but never truly got into having a painting station until I was pregnant with my daughter.
I was 8 months pregnant and couldn't find any pre-made decor that I liked for her nursery, so I decided to go to a Paint-n-Sip class and make one of their paintings. That way, I could kinda customize it to fit into her nursery better.
The painting in the middle is what I did at the Paint-n-Sip class. It originally said "Mermaid Lounge" but I changed it to have my daughter's name instead. The other 4 paintings I made within a week after the painting class. They weren't really "original" designs, though. I searched through Google and Pinterest to find marine animal paintings. I did make them a little more to my liking so that they weren't exact copies, but it helped me to get a good reference point.
Here's some good tips and tricks that I had forgotten from my grade school art classes and relearned as an adult.
Always start with the background. Trust me, it's much more difficult to add in the background colors once you have the smaller details of the main picture all done.
Use chalk! It was the weirdest thing to be told to do during my painting class but it really does help. Once your background is dry, use plain chalk to do a rough sketch of what you are about to paint. It doesn't mess up your painting at all, the fresh paint just absorbs it, and, once it's all dry, acrylic paint is pretty much waterproof so you can use a damp rag to wipe off any residual chalk.
If you mess up, no worries! You can literally paint right over it. You can do this for small mishaps or even if you want to just cover up an entire painting and start all over. The colors are so vibrant and opaque, it's rare for you to need more than one or two coatings to cover the mistake.
More expensive is not always better. Honestly, some of my favorite paintings that I've made (and sold) were made with the cheapest supplies. Yes, the nice, pricey paint tends to spread across the canvas nicer and stays wet longer so you can blend and use for a longer amount of time. But really, the $1 bottle of paint from Walmart does a pretty good job.
If your stretched canvas gets loose and floppy, flip it over and pour some water on it. Then use your fingertips to rub the water into the canvas, making sure to get into every little crack and corner. Pour out any excess water that's not absorbing and then just let it dry. You can do this on an empty canvas and one that's already been painted.
Clean your brushes promptly and properly! Try to never let the paint dry on your brush. If your brush is flat, swish it on the flat sides in the water to help keep the shape. Also, dry your brushes as soon as you get them clean by gently dabbing and wiping it on a paper towel.
Here I'm going to list both my favorite premium supplies as well as the affordable stuff.
For paint, like I said, you can easily get by for years using the cheapest of the cheap. The Apple Barrel brand is what is sold at Walmart and I was able to easily find it on Amazon as well.
Once I started getting a little more serious in my painting, I branched out to test out some of the premium brands. For me, I personally liked the Arteza brand the best. They sell pretty much every type of art medium, which helps when you want to stick with a quality you know and want to go from painting to colored pencils.
When it comes to canvasses, again, cheap is perfectly acceptable. The only thing you would have to deal with is more of a bumpy texture and some imperfections. I almost always buy in bulk to get better deals. The only time I buy an individual canvas is if I need a single, specific size or a different shape. But even then, I'll probably still buy bulk and come up with different things to paint on the extras.
You can also get the premium canvasses in bulk, which really helps the cost in the long run. I've found that the people who tend to buy premium canvasses, like the fact that it is a super smooth surface to paint on.
Another way to do canvasses is to stretch your own. In those cases, you buy a large roll of canvas (if it's not primed, you'll have to do that afterwards), cut it to size, and then use a stretch kit to get it nice and tight. I personally have not tried this method yet but I know quite a few other artists who do this.
With brushes, you don't have to be as picky when it comes to painting with acrylic, but there are definitely differences you have to pay attention to when you go to watercolor or oil painting. For the most part, you can go with the multi-packs of brushes meant for kids crafts.
If you want a more professional quality with your brushes, go for a premium brand like Arteza (I swear I'm not affiliated with them, I just really love their products lol). They take great care to make quality brushes that keep their shape and don't fall apart easily as long as you care for your brushes properly.
Find me on Instagram and show me your creations. I can't wait to see what you come up with!
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