Acrylic painting too bright - Can I darken with Acrylic Wash? Painting how to question?
Problem: your red paint has a high chroma value (actually, a nice feature) that you find is too bright for your need in this painting. Solutions: 1. Mix some more paint....add a touch of black or grey to the red colour, and paint over some or all of what you have already painted. Someone has already suggested this. I would not use this method, but it will work. It will also somewhat dull the colour. 2. Mix some more paint...add a touch of some opposing colour (i.e. Pthalo blue 15:3). The opposing colour will darken your red nicely, and then you can paint over some or all of what you have already painted. If you do not have pthalo blue, experiment with whatever blues you have until you get the right tone. I would use this method, as it will not dull the colour (in fact, I never use black, only opposing colours to get darks.) 3.As correctly mentioned, you can glaze over with some blue. This is also an excellent technique. As for tinting varnish, no. One idea you might use is to add acrylic medium to paint to thin it, but in this case you really want a darker colour, not a thinner one. Whatever you do (including my my suggestions), always try them out on a sample, not on your lovely painting. And be aware of "drying shift", or the slight change in tone when paint dries.
Can you put acrylic paint on polymer clay Before baking?
I have to disagree with ukquilter on this one. First, polymer clay shrinks almost not at all when being cured unless the clay is a large piece that's also fairly thin (...air-dry clays do shrink though, to various degrees, but not polymer clays). Acrylics can be subjected to a certain amount of heat without problems, and in fact will even "harden" a bit more than they would normally. We commonly rebake polymer clay items which have been varnished with a clear acrylic sealer, for example... that's generally done at a somewhat lower temperature than some of the brands suggest for regular curing (say, 250 or so), and for only 5-10 minutes, but there have been reports of people actually fully baking acrylic paints on polymer clay with no problems (I haven't tried it myself, but then I don't "paint on top of" my polymer clay). Acrylic paints can even be mixed *into* raw polymer clays to give them a different color, then baked fully, but acrylics aren't used that way as much as other things** just because the water they contain can turn to steam during heating. The steam is then trapped inside the oil-based clay and can't escape, so using more than a *little* acrylic paint inside clay can create bubbling and/or little areas of opacity. There will be no toxic fumes released from heating acrylics at these temps... if they get *much* hotter though, they could begin to darken, etc., just like the clay itself will. Remember polymer clay is basically plastic, and so are acrylic paints. **artists' oil paints and alcohol inks are more commonly used to change the color of clay (or of course, it's just mixed with another color of clay) If you want much more info on using acrylic paints on top of polymer clay, or inside it to change colors, and info on using clear acrylic sealers (usually glossy), check out these pages at my site: http://glassattic.com/polymer/paints.htm http://glassattic.com/polymer/color.htm http://glassattic.com/polymer/finishes.h... HTH, Diane B.
Can i add acrylic paints to polymer clay and bake it?
i just bought a box of white sculpey and i want to add color to it.... is the acrylic colors will change after its baked??? is it must be oil base paint?? thanks =]
Is there a technique for matching wet acrylic paint to an already dried colour?
W+N has an acrylic line that claims no color shift. Their binder is clear, rather than milky. One could make a color chart for wet to dry transitions. It would take some work to get an accurate color card set. I think doing this exercise would give one a practiced eye in judging potential shifts right from the palette. Easiest way to do this would be to measure the shifts in value from wet to dry.
What are the differences between tempera and acrylic paint?
There are main parts of paint. Pigment, binder, and medium. Pigment is the coloring stuff. Binder holds the paint together and on the support. Medium is how the paint is manipulated. Binder and medium are often one and the same thing. Tempera is a large group term for many types of paint that have similar qualities. They are water soluble and can be dissolved with the addition of water after they are dry. Some tempera is kind of low quality poster paint. Some start off dry like watercolor cakes. Tempera is opaque compared to watercolor. It tends to be matte and not shiny. I think of tempera as chalk in water. Dark colors will change drastically when they dry. Acrylic paint for artists is a plastic binder/medium that cures when it dries so that it can no longer be dissolved in water. Some acrylics are opaque and some are rather translucent. Acrylic is harder to mix on the surface of the painting so you need to be more decisive or add things that will slow the drying process. Acrylic paint is usually glossy although there are some tricks to making it matte like using a special matte medium or adding matting agents. Colors also shift when drying but they shift less than tempera.Edit: Deleted my duplicate account. re answering
Is it easier or harder to work with oil paints than it is with acrylics?
I work with oil paints. I believe they are both fairly difficult. Acrylic paints are made out of pigments binded with acrylic polymer emulsion. They dry thoroughly after a few minutes. They are much harder to blend so you have to work quickly. It requires great skill to achieve a realistic look with acrylic paints. If you are working on something more graphic, I'd go with acrylics. Oil paints are made out of oils and grounds pigments. Oil paints take at least three days to dry. They are easy to blend and you virtually have all the time in the world to work. However, it requires a lot of practice to work with oil paints because of the consistency. It is very, very unique. Mastering oil painting could take a decade, or even more. If you are working on something that is closer to life, I'd go with oil paints. Oils are far more expensive than acrylics. They both have their perks, but I prefer oils over acrylics because of the type of artwork I make. It all depends on what you are trying to achieve. It is all trial and error when it comes to deciding what medium you should use.Most students I work with choose to work with acrylics first, and then decide to work with oils. I'd advice you to do the same. Gain some experience with acrylics since prices aren't as steep and it'll be more convenient to experiment with. When you feel like you are ready to make the investment, begin with oils. There are great sites like guidetooilpainting.com, which explain how to get started and the materials needed. Good luck and have fun!
What are the best brands for acrylic paints? Where is the best place to buy them from regionally?
The best brands imo are also the biggest, Liquitex and Golden. They both have a very high pigment load and a smooth buttery consistency. Side by side they are very hard to tell apart. Their painting mediums are somewhat different. The standard Liquitex gloss medium and varnish is almost perfectly clear when wet. I prefer this because the color shift when mixing glazes is almost nonexistent, making the mixing of color glazes on the pallet much easier with less guesswork (hope i got that shade right because once it dries and you can see what you actually mixed it’s not coming off). The Golden liquid mediums are milky white when wet so there is some color shift, but it’s not extreme. With the thick heavy gel mediums both brands are white when wet but i find the Golden produces less color shift and i prefer its working characteristics. In terms of final quality you can’t go wrong with either. I would add, always by the professional grade. The student grade is not bad but you are actually paying top dollar for a bunch of filler and medium. With the pro grade you are mostly paying for pigment and if you want to stretch it out you can. One other brand I like a lot is M. Graham & Co. Their tube paints have the perfect consistency for glazing and the gloss medium is very nice to work with. They also make a true alizarin crimson, not a hue. I think they are the only company to make an acrylic alizarin crimson. All companies make an alizarin hue, none of them look anything like true alizarin or match alizarin’s level of transparency. Buying paint retail is very expensive unless you have a brick and mortar version of the big catalogue companies. Dick Blick and Jerry’s Art-o-Rama are two reliable sources with good prices.