Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Oils
    Oils
    Oils
    Ebook211 pages49 minutes

    Oils

    By Linda Birch

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    Relaunched in paperback, this book assumes no prior experience and is the essential guide to painting in oils for the absolute beginner.

    Full of easy-to-follow exercises and step-by-step demonstrations,’You Can Paint Oils’ will give even the most hesitant of beginners the enthusiasm and confidence to start painting in oils.

    Linda Birch takes the absolute beginner by the hand, explaining the basic oil painting materials and mark-making techniques. All the demonstrations are broken down into easy-to-follow step-by-step exercises, allowing the reader to build up their oil painting expertise gradually.

    Covering a broad range of subjects, from flowers and trees to landscapes and buildings, it won’t be long before you can produce oil paintings to be proud of.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarperCollins UK
    Release dateApr 20, 2017
    ISBN9780008123543
    Oils

    Related to Oils

    Related ebooks

    Visual Arts For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Sketching Made Easy

      Mar 18, 2022

      Sketching Made Easy
      4 min read

    • Article

      Which Comes First?

      Sep 16, 2022

      Which Comes First?
      4 min read

    • Article

      Sunbeams

      Jan 21, 2022

      Sunbeams
      7 min read

    • Article

      Oils PAINT LIKE TURNER

      Sep 4, 2020

      Oils PAINT LIKE TURNER
      6 min read

    • Article

      Beginner’s Watercolour

      Mar 18, 2022

      Beginner’s Watercolour
      8 min read

    • Article

      THE ART OF KEEPING IT simple

      Jan 24, 2020

      THE ART OF KEEPING IT simple
      5 min read

    • Article

      Exercise

      Jun 10, 2022

      Exercise
      1 min read

    • Article

      Watercolour Batik

      Sep 3, 2021

      Watercolour Batik
      5 min read

    • Article

      Art For Life

      Jul 26, 2019

      Art For Life
      3 min read

    • Article

      Back To Basics: Gouache

      Feb 18, 2022

      ■ Try 12 techniques to make the most of gouache ■ Experiment and play to familiarise yourself with the medium I am a firm believer that the best way to learn gouache is by allowing yourself the opportunity to play and experiment. Understanding the po

      5 min read

    • Article

      Learning To See

      Nov 26, 2021

      ■ Practise pure contour, modified contour, restated, gesture and controlled drawing ■ Build a daily practice with a small sketchbook There are many aspects to good drawing, but first on my list would be observation. Learning to draw is more about lea

      4 min read

    • Article

      Loose And Lively Watercolour

      Sep 3, 2021

      Loose And Lively Watercolour
      3 min read

    • Article

      Painting From Photographs

      May 14, 2021

      Painting From Photographs
      3 min read

    • Article

      The Addictive Sketcher

      Nov 27, 2020

      The Addictive Sketcher
      1 min read

    • Article

      Lessons In The Landscape

      May 14, 2021

      Lessons In The Landscape
      5 min read

    • Article

      The Art Of Copying

      Aug 6, 2021

      The Art Of Copying
      4 min read

    • Article

      The A-Z Of Pen and Wash Sketching

      Apr 21, 2020

      The A-Z Of Pen and Wash Sketching
      5 min read

    • Article

      Beginner's Watercolour

      Oct 21, 2022

      Beginner's Watercolour
      3 min read

    • Article

      Celebrate Nature

      Jan 20, 2023

      Celebrate Nature
      3 min read

    • Article

      On The Forest Floor

      May 19, 2023

      On The Forest Floor
      7 min read

    • Article

      George Frederick Thomas

      Jun 10, 2022

      George Frederick Thomas
      4 min read

    • Article

      Try Something Different

      Dec 24, 2021

      I am a watercolourist at heart, but I’m always on the lookout for other water-based media to include in my repertoire of mixed-media work. Although it has similarities to watercolour, Brusho has its own quirky and delightful properties. A big advanta

      5 min read

    • Article

      Creative Flow

      Aug 6, 2021

      Creative Flow
      5 min read

    • Article

      Gigi Will Know

      Feb 27, 2021

      What is the most helpful book – or even top three books – you would most recommend to fiction writers to improve their craft? —LURKING IN THE SHELVES Dear Lurking, I don’t love books dedicated entirely to craft. I find some of them obscure and pedant

      3 min read

    • Article

      A Botanical Painting

      Oct 11, 2018

      A Botanical Painting
      1 min read

    • Article

      Lessons In The Landscape

      Aug 6, 2021

      Lessons In The Landscape
      5 min read

    • Article

      Encaustic Art

      Jan 18, 2019

      Encaustic Art
      5 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for Oils

    0 ratings

    0 ratings0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      Oils - Linda Birch

      INTRODUCTION

      This book will help you to create your first oil paintings. You do not necessarily have to be talented or gifted in some way to be able to paint. Anyone can do it, provided they want to, and that they don’t mind making mistakes occasionally. Making mistakes is part of the learning process. Exercises need to be done, and confidence has to be built. This book leads you through simple stages to making your first pictures, even if you have never painted before.

      Oils are one of the most reassuring mediums. They are easy to put right if things go wrong – either you paint over your mistakes or you can just wipe everything off with a rag soaked in turpentine or white spirit.

      You will not need lots of special equipment or a large range of colours to get started. There are some things you must have and these are listed on pages. For example, good brushes are important, but you only need three or four – look after them well, and they will last for years.

      Naturally, when using tools or instruments, it is important to get to know them, to work out how they function, and to try them out to see what they can do. The stages in this book will enable you to do this. Above all, remember that the more you practise, the better you will be!

      Summer afternoon 35 x 19 cm (14 x 7½ in) Canvas

      Summer afternoon 35 × 19 cm (14 × 7½ in) Canvas

      HOW TO USE THIS BOOK

      This book is full of step-by-step exercises for you to follow, which will help you to progress into oil painting with confidence. If at any time an exercise does not work out for you, try it again, or go one step back to make sure that you have understood the previous exercise.

      Once you have completed a stage in the book, try something similar for yourself. For example, after the painting of fruit, set a still life up yourself and paint it. Test everything out that you read in the book – is it true, does it work for you?

      From time to time I have done demonstrations, which show you each stage that goes into making up a picture. You may find that colour mixing is one of the most difficult parts of painting. Don’t worry if the colour mixes you make don’t work out first time; like any skill, colour mixing needs a little practice to get things right. The more mixing you do, the more accurate your mixes will be.

      There is a ‘jargon buster’ included on p. to help you to become familiar with the language and terms used in painting. Unfortunately, some teachers and some books will bewilder you with jargon – although you do need to know about some terms, the rest is really common sense.

      Summer flowers 74 x 61 cm (29 x 24 in) Hardboard

      Summer flowers 74 x 61 cm (29 x 24 in) Hardboard

      BASIC MATERIALS

      You won’t need a vast amount of expensive equipment to start oil painting. Your local art materials store will sell various oil paints and brushes, and you will not need many colours or brushes to make a start. Your palette can be an old plate, and you can even paint on cardboard!

      Colours Oils come in two different grades, students’ and artists’ colours. Students’ are less expensive and are perfectly suitable for a beginner. Oils are sold in tubes of various sizes. I suggest that you buy the 22 ml size for all the colours except white, which you will need in a 115 ml tube. This is because you will need more white for mixing than the other colours.

      The colours that I use in this book are:

      Titanium White

      Cadmium Yellow Pale

      Lemon Yellow

      Rose Madder

      Cadmium Red

      Crimson Alizarin

      French Ultramarine

      Coeruleum

      Cobalt Blue

      Viridian

      Burnt Umber

      Yellow Ochre

      Raw Sienna

      To help you learn to mix your colours, I have kept to simple mixes in this book.

      A palette of the colours used in this book

      A palette of the colours used in this book

      A selection of materials used for oil painting

      A selection of materials used for oil painting

      Brushes Three brushes will usually suffice for most purposes. You will need a large (size 8) round-ended hog bristle brush, for large areas of paint such as skies. A medium-sized (size 6) square-ended hog bristle (known as a ‘bright’) is helpful for general work. I also use a small, soft nylon round brush (size 4) for detailed work and drawing out. The higher the number, the larger the brush.

      Palette and painting knives Palette knives are long-bladed and round-ended. Originally used for mixing colours on the palette, they can be used to lay paint onto the picture instead of or as well as brushes.

      Painting knives are small, trowel-shaped knives shaped especially

      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1