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PAINTING FOREVER

Best Paints For Canvas Painting

By DandelionclubPublished 3 years ago 6 min read
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Art is not just about putting colors or brush to paper and making something wonderful. It is tied in with letting out your feeling of expression and entering a condition of innovativeness where you can uncover the most profound pieces of your creative mind, communicate with your thoughts and apply them to whatever you want to make something. It is fundamentally about the imagination; conceptualizing for your next task and setting up your materials. It is significant that you are completely set up before you start an art project, which means having all the right tools and resources.

Awaken your artistic spirit and discover endless possibilities of creativity; throw in those colors and see your imagination come to life. Getting sorted out for a task can be one of the most energizing parts of art as you can pick every single detail to make your vision become reality. One of the most significant materials in your project arrangement is your surface and the type of paint that would go with it.

What you will need

· Your inner creativity

· Canvas

· Brushes

· Palette Knife

· Oil Paint

· Acrylic Paint

· Watercolor Paint

The most commonly used paints and the best paints for canvas painting are acrylics, oils, watercolors, and pastels. What you select will depend on your personality and, to some extent, what you want to paint.

Choosing the Right Canvas

Canvas is a medium that has been utilized for many years going back to the fourteenth century. In addition to the fact that canvas serves as an incredible surface for artists. Its blank and clear surface gives your thoughts a chance to be boundless, giving you the opportunity to take your visions any place you want.

Linen is especially useful for oil painting and is commonly utilized by proficient artists. Cotton canvas is more utilized these days and gives brilliant results.

Using Acrylic Paints

Acrylic paints are amongst some of the common paints. They are known for their smooth texture and vibrant results. Since they are easy to work with, they are considered a good option for various surfaces, they are ideal for canvas paintings. They do not require other supplies with it and are also known for drying up quickly. You can either use a paintbrush or palette knife for them and a primed canvas is an ideal choice for its surface. As for the quality, the 'heavy body' thick acrylic paints are considered the best choice for a canvas.

However, if you go with the thinner paint, which is also known as the 'fluid acrylic', would not be a wise choice as you will spend most of your time worrying over the dripping paint if the painting is standing on an easel.

Advantages

1) Dries up quickly

2) They are water-based/Soluble in water

3) Once it is dried, it can easily be over-painted

4) One can easily take advantage of its thick consistency and even add water to thin the consistency

5) Great for murals for their water resistance

6) Can be used for collages for its ability to act as a glue

7) The brushes can easily be cleaned with water

Disadvantages

1) They contain toxic pigments similar to oil paints

2) Since they dry up very quickly, you have to be quick with your painting and merging. This will even cause you to use a lot more water.

3) Once you have painted with them the canvas, there is no way you can remove them off the surface as they go waterproof.

4) If you do not wash your brush then and thereafter using them, once the paint dries up, it becomes very difficult to remove it off the brush.

5) The colors appear to be darker once they have dried up, if not used with thin washes.

Cost

It won't be a surprise to know that acrylic paints for canvas painting come in a variety of ranges, varying form consistency to quality. Obviously the higher quality paints will cost more than the others. Similarly, you will require brushes and other supplies of the same quality. The good thing is that you will not need anything other than water to dilute them.

Using Water Paints

As the name suggests, water paints are soluble in water . They can be mixed with water as well as traditional oils. However, these paints are not best suited for canvas. They have an irregular pattern of drying and often form beads. You can choose them for mixed media painting for a canvas, but then too, they should not be the base for it. They are known to work better with an absorbent watercolor paper.

Advantages

1) Easy to mix and clean with water

2) If the paint on the tube or the pallet has dried up, it can be reused by mixing some water.

3) Paint can be removed off the surface by re-wetting it.

Disadvantages

1) It can be hard to hide or correct any mistakes with them being so transparent.

2) The colors appear much lighter when dried up than what they were originally while you were painting.

3) There is no choice of adding white paint in watercolors, except for leaving the space blank on a white paper.

Cost

Watercolor paints are known to be the cheapest out there. You can simply suit yourself by buying a basic set of watercolors and brushes at a very low price. Apart from that, you will just require a white paper and a board as extra supplies. You can wish to buy brown gummed tape to stretch the paper if you require it.

Using Oil Paints

Oil paint is a winner with its thick, gluey consistency when it comes to canvas painting. It is the perfect paint ingredient paired beautifully with canvas. Whether it’s traditional oil paint or water-soluble oil paint, both oils are very well suited for canvas painting. The thick, viscous texture requires a solid painting surface to rest upon that will not be ruined by the oil in these oil paints, and a primed canvas does just that. Like acrylic, a brush or a palette knife can be used to apply oil paints; one can even use oil pigment bars (sort of like oil pastels).

Advantages

• Dries slowly, therefore allows plenty of time to work and to blend colors

• Can be over-painted without disturbing underlying layers after drying

• Rich, deep and vibrant colors

• The paint maintains its intensity when dry

• Can be used thickly or in thin, smooth glazes

• A classic (used by the Old Artists)

Disadvantages

• Thinned with solvent and/or oils, so need to work in a well-ventilated area

• Slow-drying

• Need to use an alkyd medium to speed up drying

• Have to wait several months to ensure painting is dry before it can be varnished

• Brushes have to be usually cleaned with oil-dissolving solvent, though you can use dishwashing liquid ad well

Cost

There is a large range of oil paints, from top-quality to cheap paints with little pigment and lots of filler in the market. You will need a selection of colors, at least one brush, some canvas to paint on, some oils to dilute the paint, a palette for putting out your colors and mixing them and dissolving solvents. So these are some high maintenance paints.

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About the Creator

Dandelionclub

Writer, Hobbyist, Traveller, Art Lover

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