During this course you will be introduced to all of the accepted forms of Oil Painting, the medium, tools and materials required. You will not be taught that one style or way is the only way, merely given a new language in which you may make your own choices. You will, though, be shown the variety and versatility of the medium and warned of some of the technical mistakes.
In order to teach you Oil painting I will have to make sure that you understand, fully, about colour and tone as some of the techniques rely upon technical competence and a knowledge of colour intensity, warm and cool and tonal values.

Let us begin. --- Equipment you will need.-:

Here are examples of the most commonly used brushes for calligraphy, ceramics, Watercolour and oil painting.

The only brushes that you will be concerned with are the -:

1. Rigger - used, traditionally, for painting the rigging on sailing boats. Now very useful for any fine lines.
2. Flat sable fan - useful for blending colours e.g. clouds.
3. Flat (rectangle) used by the impressionists for laying direct strokes of Impasto colour. Also useful for larger flat areas of colour.
4. Round - Versatile, all round brushes.

These brushes come with long or short handles. I prefer the long handles for control and ease, you can always shorten your grip.
The bristles for oil painting would be Hog Hair, Sable or Nylon (T.V.B. - Prolon, etc.) Lovely though Sable is it is also very expensive, Hogs hair is a little too stiff for most applications, I favour the Nylon brushes that are virtually equal to Sable but much cheaper. Two sets of Long Handle Prolon Brushes in both round and flat
In sizes 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, will suffice, one round sable rigger, size 2, and possibly a flat sable fan will enable you to do all of the lessons.

Palette Knives and Painting Knives :-

In the above illustration you will notice that they are two different tools. The Palette Knife is usually stiffer and has a handle in line with the blade, the Painting knife has the handle raised above the handle in order to keep the knuckles away from the paintings surface. For costs sake it would be possible to purchase Painting knives for both purposes. I would suggest a long blade and two triangular trowel blades of medium and small.

The Palette :-

A simple palette may be merely a piece of primed hardboard, varnished plywood (which is all the above traditional palette is, but cut into a fancy shape) or a piece of perspex. Perspex has the advantage that it is easily cleaned and undamaged by any paint remover. I have two rectangles of perspex, one as my paint holding surface and one to mix on.

You will note the clip on Terps containers on the illustrated palette. Plastic or glass beakers will do as well.

Several pieces of rag will be very useful.

Easels. :- A portable sketching easel will do you for most of your work, but a larger studio easel will be handy for larger works and steadiness.

Finally :- An old small suitcase for carrying your paints, or one of the modern tool boxes/seats, the perspex palettes can be cut to fit within these. If you do not wish to clean and waste your valuable oil paint each trip then a useful tip is to gently wrap a plastic carrier bag around the whole palette and dispose of the bag later. If this is done carefully your paints will not smudge.

Paints :- Student quality oil paints will do you adequately. When looking at the labels you may notice stars. These are the permanence rating. Like the star rating for a Hotel, the more stars then the better the paint.
I would suggest the following colours, which will allow you to do everything.

Titanium White. Lamp Black. Yellow Ochre. Burnt Sienna. Raw Umber.
Burnt Umber. This will give you a limited palette.

Lemon Yellow, Chrome Yellow, Viridian Green, Emerald Green,
Chrome Green, Cadmium Red, Alizrin Crimson, Cobalt Blue, Ultramarine Blue, Cerulean Blue, Cadmium Orange, Cobalt Violate, Prussian Blue.
For a full palette.

True turpentine (turps) should be used but when learning white spirit/turpentine substitute may be used.

You are now equipped to paint, but what is oil paint ?

What is "Oil Paint"?

Pigment, drying agent and linseed oil. Permanence. Check the amount of "star rating" (as you would a hotel, and consider the quality e.g. Artists quality or students. Thinners. Turpentine, white spirit. (any spirit, even petrol in emergency). Linseed Oil, the binder, which can be further added to the oil paint to give more plasticity or to the spirit if the paint is sinking too quickly. Care of brushes. Obviously a coarser canvas will wear down a brush more quickly than a smooth board, wash brushes well after use in clean turps, being careful to reach up to the base without splaying the fibres. If you have tip cover tubes, especially for rigging brushes, then it is wiser to use them. A brush that dries bent usually stays bent.

Drying time and varnishing. White and some blues take longer to dry than most other colours, so beware of anything mixed with it for a while. One should also be aware of the potential problems of laying faster drying colours over or under slower ones and lean over fat painting as rippling and cracking can occur. Total drying time will depend upon the primed surface and its absorbency, temperature, ultra violet light and air circulation.

As an average the surface will be totally touch dry in a week. Depending upon the thickness of paint varnishing may be done between six weeks, in the case of a very thin painting, to minimum of six months for heavier work. Cracking or rippling can occur if done prematurely. When oil paint is totally dry it is insoluble, nearly all varnishes are not and therefore can be carefully removed with turps at a later stage.
Be careful where thin glazes or washes of oil have been used though.

Working surfaces. Virtually any surface that has some form of "bite" can be used to paint on. Traditionally this has been wooden boards or canvas. Modern materials would probably be half inch marine ply, sanded and primed properly several times. This would prove heavy and expensive. Hardboard is a useful, light alternative but do not make the mistake of painting on the rough side, it may appear to look like canvas but is the reverse texture. Prime and use the smooth side. Any absorbent material such as cardboard or canvas may be used but must be glue sized before priming as the oil from the paint will gradually rot the material, over time.
Canvas , this may be purchased unstretched but will need a stretching frame making, the canvas sized and primed. Canvas comes in several materials and textures from heavy to fine. This is also the choice with commercially prepared canvases.
Daler Boards are a canvassed textured and pre-primed board, but don't have the nice bounce that a stretched canvas has.

Acrylics as an alternative. The differences. Acrylics are a plastic or resin based paint and have advantages and disadvantages. Advantages. Fast drying, Fast glazing, Impasto, no smell, unlikely to cause an allergy (water is the medium), can be used on unprimed papers and textures, easier to transport a fresh painting, etc.
Disadvantages. Although drying retardents can be purchased and mixed with the paint, this is time consuming and defeats the object, but a fast drying paint can mean wastage. Brushes tend to clog with dry paint, a disposable tear away paper sheet palette is advisable. Changes have Jo be made by over painting. Otherwise standard oil painting techniques can be used.

Applying paint or the method

Body Colour - Addition of white to the colour
Scumbling - Surface brush strokes over another colour.
Often with fairly dry brush
Frottie - Glaze containing White
Scraping Back - Use of a flat palette knife to give a thin remaining layer
Rubbing - Fingers. (Used by many past leading artists, e.g.
Leonardo, Titian, Turner)
Glazing - Thin layers of pure paint.
Washing - Thinned down paint layered on
Impasto - Heavy use of paint and texture
Pulling - Pulling surface colour back to under colour by
Absorbing surface with cloth or sponge.
Dabbing - Using a cloth or sponge to apply paint texturally
With a Scumbling effect.
Blending - Merging one colour into another.
Brush Marks - Brush marks and knife marks for effect, can also
Be used to highlight surface textures.
Teasing - Working into existing wet paint to give
Additional texture
Hatching - Cross Hatching brush strokes.
Spattering - Flicking brush
Scoring into wet paint - Remove lines with a knife from top coat to
Reveal under colour
Adding Texture - Adding other materials such as washed and
Dried sand to the paint
Collage - Adding other media and materials to the work.

Techniques of ways of using these methods to produce paintings

Alla Prima (Direct Painting) - "At the first attempt". The painting all in
One session e.g. The Impressionists

Variations of Alla Prima

Wet in Wet - Beware of slower drying colours under fast
(Building up - Fat over Lean - The use of thinner underpainting and heavier
over painting
Wet over dry - Alla prima if not scumbled
Painting to completion in sections - Alla prima each section
Varying thickness - Alla prima over a ground

Three Tone - The use of Dark, Medium and Light tones only
Painting in layers - Water-colours Gouche, Pastel - Glazes
Dead Colour - Basic tonal ground work, e.g. Black and white
Under painting overglazed with blue.

Glossary

1. Pigment = the coloured powder used to make paint
2. Linseed Oil = Made from the flax plant, the medium used with pigment to make oil paint. Linen, often used in the making of canvases also comes from flax
3. Toned or coloured ground = A coloured primer or a colour worked into the primed surface before the main painting begins. Usually a warm mid tone, e.g. burnt umber
4. Broken Colour = Use of small areas of colour side by side to confuse the brain by "optical mixing" e.g. the Pointillists, the Impressionists
5. Masking = Using tape or a template to temporarily mask an area or line you are painting up to.
6. Primary Colours = Red,Yellow, Blue, Secondary = Orange, Green, Purple. Tertiary = Brown.

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