Australian How To Paint magazine chooses a topic or style of art each issue and gives you a comprehensive guide for you to develop your skills. Over the series we will cover all major painting technques plus popular paint ideas.
Australian artist, painter and tutor, Don Milner chooses themes and subjects from Australia's rich and unique way of life, its characters and scenery, all of which inspire, colour and enrich his world as an artist. His honest, intuitive approach to painting have won Don many awards and accolades, which has led to lost of commissioned art works produced in his popular themes. Artists who influence and inspire him include Rubens, Rembrandt, Velazquez, and Godward. Modern day masters include Norman Lindsay, Sydney Long, Rupert Bunny, Tom Roberts, and James Whistler, and contemporary artists include Ralf Heimans, Richard Schmid, Hal Barton, Herman Pekel, and Kevin Beilfuss. “I am primarily a 'visual communicator' using images to tell stories in my own way as I celebrate my ‘freedom of expression’ through mediums such as…
This workshop aims to give a better understanding of the process I utilise to create a good likeness in a portrait using acrylic paints and mediums. It shows how I employ techniques developed over many years and helps give a better understanding of the process so that you can have the confidence to try this at home and create a successful portrait of your own. BRUSHES I choose the largest brush I can to get the job done. My advice is to choose the brush size you think will get the job done and then try to go at least one size larger! My choice of brushes for this portrait is broken into four stages of painting: 1. EARLY BLOCKING IN Tonal wash over pencil sketch to cover it and…
• A good and sturdy floor or desk easel is a great asset in any artist’s studio • Suitable palette or 2 white plastic dinner plates • Painting knife for mixing • 2 water containers (ice cream containers or similar) • Dishwashing liquid • 4B pencil • Kneaded eraser • Willow charcoal stick 3-4mm x 1 • Stretched canvas • Fine mister water sprayer • Clean cloth or rags • Two old towels • Box of plain white tissues – Brushes: • Hog Bristle: Bright (#12, #10) + Flat (#8, #6) + Filbert (#6) • Taklon Pointed Round (#4 or #6) • Taklon Flat (#6, #4, #2) • Taklon Liner (#1) – Paint: • I use artist’s quality paint for the best results, which are both rich and smooth, with…
Skin colours and tones: This is a very important area and is subjective to each individual artist. I find testing the mixed colours on the palm of my hand offers a good colour/tone indicator. Tonal value scale: I use a ten step tonal scale, with ‘0’ being white and ‘10” being black with tonal steps between. Prepare and take good reference photographs of the model. Face and figure proportions are always important to the portrait artist, and can take much practise to fully understand and apply. A good reference photo is a valuable tool to assist this understanding. Photographic reference: In a perfect world, I love to paint from the model during live studio sittings. Unfortunately, in our modern world this luxury is not always available. Therefore, I often choose…
Why I started painting: From the time I was very young, I felt the pull of art. My early experiences included visits to art museums with my family. Seeing Pinkie and The Blue Boy at the Huntington Art Museum was an eye-opening experience. I had begun drawing faces and was fascinated by artists’ ability to achieve a three dimensional illusion. My great aunt, a teacher, noticed my interest and encouraged me to draw. I’ll always remember her support. My family was always up for a summer vacation adventure. We backpacked in the wilderness, boated and fished in Mexico, drove across country, wandered Yellowstone, and flew to Hawaii, exposing me to new and wondrous things to study. How would I paint the way the water moved, the way the sun sparkled…
MATERIALS • Paper: Arches artist-grade cold-press paper, 140 lb (stretched on a plywood board) or 300 lb. clipped on gatorboard. • Brushes: A full range of round synthetic and sable brushes from a 00 through a #36-Goliath (Robert Simmons white sable). I like both Robert Simmons white sable and Princeton brushes, and also use Raphael sables. • Palette: Robert E Wood rectangular palette with cover • Paints: – Winsor Yellow – Permanent Rose – Winsor Blue Green Shade – Winsor Dioxazine Violet – Winsor Orange – Perylene Green – Winsor Green Gold – Cobalt Blue • Two water containers: quart or larger plastic containers • 2B pencil and sharpener or automatic pencil • Graphite transfer paper (no wax) for transferring your image to watercolour paper • Kneaded eraser • Household…
