First, you need to set up your space. You easel should be set in such a way that you can see your subject without much twisting back and forth. The canvas should be raised to eye level. Your palette should be set in front of you so that you can get your paints on your brush then right to your canvas, again without much movement. Ideally, you should be able to see your canvas, your subject and your palette all in one view.
Now we can paint! Ok, not really. The canvas needs to be primed with gesso before you start painting. Why? If you don't, the oil paints will soak into the canvas. We're painting. Not dying canvas. So prime that canvas with an acrylic gesso. Fun fact: you can use oil paints over acrylic but not acrylic over oils. I didn't know that!
Once the gesso is dry, we toned our canvas with burnt sienna. We thinned the paint out with mineral spirits and painted very loosely and haphazardly so it wasn't uniform or neat. It didn't make sense at first but it did later. It looked like this once we were done.
After the canvas was primed, we "sketched" out the very basic layout of the painting paying attention to composition. One easy way to think about the composition is to remember that people like odd numbers of things like 1 apple, 3 books, etc. Also, when laying out the design on your canvas, divide the canvas either literally or in your mind into thirds both across the length and height.Where the lines cross is a good place for a focal point. Having a focal point in the dead center of the canvas isn't usually very pleasing to the eye.
Its easy at this point to "erase" lines by wetting your brush with mineral spirits and painting out your lines. It isn't important to make everything perfect or detailed at this point because you will be making lots of changes. As you can see, the shapes are just very basic. Once everything is in place and you (or your instructor) is happy with the layout, you can start "drawing" in the actual shapes making sure the angles are accurate. An easy way to insure the angles are accurate is to use sighting. Sighting is measuring things in relationship to other things. Sighting it easy to do but hard to explain. I would highly recommend looking it up if you haven't used sighting in your work.
Here is my painting after I have drawn in my subject.
After you are happy with the basic drawing, it is time to start blocking in the basic colors of your painting.
After the basic colors are in place, then it is time to start painting the actual objects. The general rule in oil painting it darker colors first with thin coats then go to the lighter colors with thicker coats. It is also important to maintain a correct position in regards to your subject and color palette. You should be able to see your subject and canvas without much movement as well as make sure your paint palette is within easy reach.
Here I started adding detail to the books painting the entire book first with the darkest color of the book then working towards the brighter areas adding highlights. Never just add white to a color for a highlight. Always add a touch of the color on the opposite end of the color wheel to tone down the highlight color. White in itself doesn't brighten but actually dulls the color. It sounds weird, I know, but it is true!
I have changed the background here and added a different painting. When adding in a work by someone else, make it very impressionistic! I didn't think about that but if you make it too perfect then it becomes plagiarism and nobody wants that!When adding a highlight to something like the apple, add just a little of the highlight color then remove it ever so gently while brushing it out with a dry brush. Its tricky and quite frankly it annoys me but the end result it worth it.
I need to work on a few more things still but its coming along!
Here is my painting submitted for the first grading. Oops, I forgot the shadows on the table!
I added the shadows and worked on a few other things like my little native american guy in the lower left corner. I think I'm done with this painting. Maybe someday I'll go back and work on the bird's nest that I am really not happy with but right now I am done. Its been a learning process and I have learned a lot. Like maybe this style of painting isn't for me. Or maybe it is, I just need a subject I would be interested in painting. I'm glad I did it though. Now on to the next project!
