If your acrylic paintings are looking too rough when you try to blend, try this tool to keep everything smooth! This tool will help keep your acrylic paints wet longer so that you have time to blend like you would in oil paints! I’m showing you this tool in action to blend clouds in wet over dry vs drybrushing and again in a more advanced raccoon painting!
We’ve all seen the beginner painting books that teach you to dry brush. Now there is a place for dry brushing, the problem is when you use it on EVERYTHING and your painting ends up looking really rough. Fine if that’s the look you’re going for, but what if you want it to blend smoothly like an oil painting?
I love oils, I love acrylics. If used right, you can’t tell a difference between my oils and acrylics. That is a personal preference, you paint how you want, but if you want yours to look like mine, let me show you this tool along with a few VERY important warnings to help you get the best results!
The fine mist sprayer is the answer. You can use it to keep your paint wet on the canvas for as long as you need to to keep it wet for blending, just like when working in oils, OR you can use it to blend wet paint into a dry area. You may be thinking “why can’t I just use a regular spray bottle?” While regular spray bottles are great for disciplining your husband <clip>but they aren’t great for art, the water droplets are too large and ununiformed. Instead, use this fine mist sprayer!
The video above shows is a side by side comparison of smooth blending and dry brushing. See how rough the dry brushed areas look? It’s easier, but it looks…well, not great. I’m using a blush brush or mop brush (the blush brush sheds less) to softly smooth out my brush strokes. Just a tip, That brush needs to be completely dry to work. If it starts picking up too much paint or water it will create brush strokes instead of softly smoothing them out.
Supplies Used (amazon affiliate links)
- Fredrix Blue Label Ultra Smooth Canvas 16×20″ https://amzn.to/3rEoYYM
- Fine Mist Sprayer https://amzn.to/3qS3HKC
- Blending Brush (it’s a makeup brush that I use as a mop brush) https://amzn.to/35fzZrT
- Liquitex Basics Acrylic Paints http://amzn.to/2qjrVgU
- Liquitex Gloss Varnish http://amzn.to/2qyQLbU
- Water Well (to clean the brushes) http://amzn.to/2oTlnU7
- Masterson Art Palette http://amzn.to/2oTxccT
- New Wave Glass Palette http://amzn.to/2AXj9KL
- Clamp light for my easel http://amzn.to/2CSYyHr
- Transfer Paper https://amzn.to/3b9M2UX
- Tracing paper https://amzn.to/2yzh62Z
- Stylus https://amzn.to/3qW1rlt
- White Charcoal Pencil https://amzn.to/34ACqVL
- Glass Scraper (to clean my palette) https://amzn.to/34pKIPT
We all need to be reminded “Don’t drink the paint water” and other fun artist sayings.
Why not wear it on our clothes or coffee mugs to make sure we don’t forget. LachriMerch.com
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