ACRYLIC LESSON 2

Boats with Tom Swimm

To create a mood for your painting, underpaint the canvas with warm or cool colors, depending on the desired atmosphere. (Warm colors are associated with happiness and excitement, as well as summer; cool colors are likened to calm and melancholy, as well as winter.) In this scene, the warm underpainting results in a summery, tropical feeling.

1 First work out your sketch on the canvas, using both a pencil and a permanent marker to make a rough drawing. Define the basic shapes of the boats, as well as the outline of the clouds and the shadows on the beach. Then use a large flat brush to cover the surface with a warm, water-thinned, transparent layer of medium magenta.

2 Begin blocking in color using a large flat brush and paint thinned with acrylic gloss medium and water. Apply light blue mixed with phthalo blue for the sky and water, using raw sienna for the boats and beach. Also add a little of the blue mix to the inside of the boat on the left to represent reflected light. Define the shadow areas using Payne’s gray for the underside of the clouds and dioxazine purple for the shadows in the foreground and on the boats.

3 Apply color more thickly, using light blue for the sky between the clouds and phthalo blue for the water. Paint around the hulls of the boats, adding dioxazine purple and Payne’s gray to the shadows. Then darken the shadows with burnt sienna, and add a layer of raw sienna to the boats and the beach. Finally, add details to the foreground boat, using light blue-violet mixed with Payne’s gray for the hull and burnt sienna for the stripe.

4 Now darken the underside of the clouds using Payne’s gray mixed with light blue-violet. Mix phthalo blue, phthalo green, and white with an acrylic gloss medium to keep the paint wet and help it blend smoothly; then apply a gradated wash (see page 12) to the water with a medium flat brush, starting at the horizon line. Also apply this mix inside the boat on the left. Next add another layer of color to the boat hulls and the beach, using the same mixes from step two.

5 Mix unbleached titanium, Naples yellow, and flesh for the tops of the clouds, boat canopy, and hull highlights. The shadows are a mix of dioxazine purple, Payne’s gray, and burnt sienna; the edges and seats are light blue. Mix cadmium red light, burnt sienna, and raw sienna for the right boat hull; cadmium red light and yellow ochre for the left hull; and cadmium red light and burnt sienna for the foreground hull. Use a mix of cadmium yellow medium and cadmium red light to brighten the highlights. Drybrush the foreground shadows and add highlights with a mix of Payne’s gray and light blue-violet.

6 To finish, mix several paint colors for the beach using cadmium yellow medium, raw sienna, Naples yellow, flesh, and white. To add contrast and interest in this area, create several mixes, using varying proportions of each color. With a large flat brush and a thicker mix of these colors, apply highlights on the beach, varying the direction of the brushstrokes. Build up the colors overall, adding the final details to the clouds, boat hull, and support posts. Finish the far boat by drybrushing a few strokes for the highlight.