A winter's landing

Calling this one done.  There will be a tiny bit of tinkering, but I really am fed up with the sight of the thing, hence done.

I learnt a lot from this, my third attempt at acrylics.

Biggest lessen is to gesso the board first. Either paint on matt white or use a hobby spray gun or even summat like Halford spray can. Give it a quick sanding with 600 or 1000 grade wet'n'dry to give a consistent smooth surface, and it stops cardboard fibres rising up in reaction to water in the acrylic paint.

I had several disasters with this thing, starting off with the wrong colour of blue; then spilling blue paint over the bottom left hand corner of the painting; followed by mixing the wrong colour of blue again and making it too dark.

I persevered, simply using this painting to learn how to use acrylic paint i.e. a practice painting.  I decided if worst came to worst, I simply start again by over spraying the whole lot with a can of Halfords white. It is acrylic, and I understand its propertied.

However, I did discover the joys of using white, and the difference between zinc white and titanium white. I tended not to use white as a water colourist.  Therefore it was a case of overturning four years of being averse to using the stuff.

  • Sounds like pure agony Angus but end result is good!

  • Well done you, on persevering to get the finished result, and a beautiful one at that. You are very talented, afraid one that I do not have. Now you have learned all the doos and don'ts, you are set to carry on creating more beautiful paintings.

  • Unknown said:

    Calling this one done.  There will be a tiny bit of tinkering, but I really am fed up with the sight of the thing, hence done.

    I learnt a lot from this, my third attempt at acrylics.

    Biggest lessen is to gesso the board first. Either paint on matt white or use a hobby spray gun or even summat like Halford spray can. Give it a quick sanding with 600 or 1000 grade wet'n'dry to give a consistent smooth surface, and it stops cardboard fibres rising up in reaction to water in the acrylic paint.

    I had several disasters with this thing, starting off with the wrong colour of blue; then spilling blue paint over the bottom left hand corner of the painting; followed by mixing the wrong colour of blue again and making it too dark.

    I persevered, simply using this painting to learn how to use acrylic paint i.e. a practice painting.  I decided if worst came to worst, I simply start again by over spraying the whole lot with a can of Halfords white. It is acrylic, and I understand its propertied.

    However, I did discover the joys of using white, and the difference between zinc white and titanium white. I tended not to use white as a water colourist.  Therefore it was a case of overturning four years of being averse to using the stuff.

    A superb finish Angus.

    When you mentioned aerosol paint, 600 or 1000 grit wet/dry, it reminded me of the days when I used to try remove rust from old bangers.

    I'm sure I spent more money on those old bangers than they were actually worth...

  • Thanks, Wendy, Catlady and Mike.

    I must be doing something wrong. Painting was supposed to be a restful pastime, one that you are supposed to enjoy.  Maybe I try too hard.

    Not entirely sure what to do next.  I've abandoned my idea for a gritty painting for now, partly as I do not really like gritty and partly as I discovered it is not too late to enter my thought provoking paintings on how us lot are affecting the environment. I might do a mushrump next.  :-)

  • Unknown said:

    Thanks, Wendy, Catlady and Mike.

    I must be doing something wrong. Painting was supposed to be a restful pastime, one that you are supposed to enjoy.  Maybe I try too hard.

    Not entirely sure what to do next.  I've abandoned my idea for a gritty painting for now, partly as I do not really like gritty and partly as I discovered it is not too late to enter my thought provoking paintings on how us lot are affecting the environment. I might do a mushrump next.  :-)

    You're welcome.

    Sometimes you can try too hard, but rest assured your efforts are not in vain.

  • This is beautiful Angus - well worth persevering.  I like the muted colour pallet you have used.     I don't know much about the technicalities of gesso-ing boards etc - I have tended to use either specialist acrylic paper (with a "canvas" surface) - or ready prepared boards or canvases.  Some of them are pretty low cost - especially if you buy them online from somewhere like Jacksons Art or GreatArt.

  • Eeeek! I get snowed under with work for a couple of weeks, and when I come back summat 'orrible has happened to the forums interface. Possibly nicer, great for mobile/tablet users, a bit of a surprise to an old duffer like me. I like the way you can see all the post thread and replies.

    Maggy, high praise indeed!  Thank you.

    I've tried out priming my mount board with a 'gesso' to see what it does.  The 'gesso' I used was trade Leyland acrylic white primer, which you can pick up a 750ml tin from the DIY stores for roughly £11. I bought mine from Screwfix for £6.95 as it was on special offer.

    It is quite thick, but you can thin it down with water. I used a 1" flat artist brush to paint it onto A3 and A2 sheets of mount board.  Two coats went onto the blank A2 sheet.  Three coats went onto the A3 sheet, as it already had an unfinished acrylic painting on it.

    What you do next depends on what surface you want. The 1" artist brush, although quite fine, still left a not entirely smooth surface - think not hot watercolour paper.  This is an ideal surface for some painters.

    I, on the other hand, like my surface to be dead smooth. I always used hot press watercolour paper. I sanded the primer with 600 grit wet'n'dry paper - using it wet.  You can sand the acrylic quite hard, but not too hard or for too long otherwise you'll sand it all off!

    The resulting surface felt as smooth as glass.

    As for painting on it. The first surprise was that acrylics took a longer to dry. I guess when I painted onto paper/mount board the paint would soak into it, thus drying almost instantaneously. This happened to a lesser extent when painting onto acrylic I had already applied.

    The second surprise was that I could then push the paint around the surface of the primer. Much of my painting style consists of pushing paint around the paper.

    I now get a nice smooth finish as the wetness of the acrylic does not cause the fibres of the paper to rise, which in turn catches paint on the raised bits therefore giving a speckled affect.

  • I've not tried using a really smooth surface for acrylics - tend to use a canvas board e.g. Daler or Jacksons.   I find Hot Pressed watercolour paper pretty tricky to use - your watercolour technique is obviously very good.  I agree re new forum - I'm finding it tricky too!

    Hope you get time to do and post more paintings soon :)