Expressive Brushstrokes with Acrylics - Painting Loosely

in this lesson we'll loosen up a bit and create an acrylic painting with expressive brush drugs [Music] hello everyone Matt here with the virtual instructor comm and in this video we're going to take a look at creating an acrylic painting using expressive brushstrokes now you might assume that if you want to create looser more expressive brushstrokes and a painting that you just need to work quickly and just use larger brushes well part of that is true using a larger brush helps and timing yourself also helps as well but if we want to create a painting that has expressive brush stroking where the brush strokes are really the star of the show then we actually need to slow down and think about each one of the brush strokes that we make so without further ado let's take a look at this demonstration I hope you enjoy the video will begin on Jess ode panel now I've prepared this panel surface with a layer of a mixture of titanium white and burnt umber there's a touch of yellow ochre in there as well this will provide us with a nice neutral base in which to create the painting upon then using a graphite pencil we can go in and sketch the outer contours of our subject in this case a simple pair we don't need to worry about any of the details with this initial sketch however you might find it beneficial to go ahead and sketch out some of the shapes of tone and value which will make the painting process a little bit easier now of course for this painting in particular I'm trying to concentrate on loosening up with my brush strokes this doesn't necessarily mean painting quicker it just means being more deliberate with your brush stroking this is often referred to as a brush stroke economy limiting the number of strokes that you use to create a painting while concentrating on the shapes of color and value as you add them I'm also limiting the amount of time that I spend on this painting I'm going to try to create this small painting it's only 5 inches by 7 inches in under an hour once we've got our basic sketch in place we can go in with our initial application of acrylic paint using a larger flat brush we'll go in and start defining some of the areas of darkest value I'll use some of the graphite lines as a god I'm trying to use the most deliberate brushstroke that I possibly can to fill in the space I'm working slowly with the brush strokes here concentrating on the shape of value that I create this is a mixture of burnt umber with a touch of Prussian blue and yellow ochre I'll stick with this larger brush as long as I possibly can this of course will contribute to our time saving but it will also allow us to be looser and more deliberate with our brush strokes remember the goal of this painting is not to create a highly detailed and rendered version of the pair but instead to create a more expressive version of the pair with deliberate and expressive brush stroking we'll move over now to still a darker value but more in line with a mid-tone this is yellow ochre again with a touch of burnt umber we're applying the paint rather thickly on the surface now of course since this surface is smooth the brushstrokes are going to be clearly defined this is something that we're after with a painting like this we want the brushstrokes to be the star of the show so to speak we'll continue working our way towards the side of the light source progressively getting the lighter with our values again this is yellow ochre with just a touch of burnt umber we'll carefully work around the area of highlight now that we've got our initial values and colors in place we can start to add a bit more depth to the color will introduce a touch of cadmium red to our mixture well add this color initially along the terminator' line where the darker value meets the mid-tone we'll also add an indication of a reflective highlight on the opposite side of the light source with every brush stroke that we make will carefully consider its significance to the final painting when taking this approach to a painting our brushstrokes should be deliberate and each brushstrokes should have some level of significance now we'll go back and start to darken up the area of course shadow again will create a mixture of Prussian blue burnt umber and a bit of yellow ochre we can see that with this second application our shape of value is more clearly defined we'll do the same in the area of mid-tone allowing some of the cadmium red to stay in our mixture [Music] it's okay in fact it's encouraged to work very slowly and consider every single brush stroke that you make while some of the brush strokes will undoubtedly be covered up many of them will contribute to the final feeling and expressive nature of the painting we'll add a hint of a slightly lighter value on the right side of the pier and then we'll add some indications of slightly darker value on the side of the pair that's closest to the light source now we'll add in an additional color this pair is yellow but it has a color relationship with some hints of green and red we'll try to exploit this color relationship as we go through the painting this will add to the expressive qualities of the painting and additional interest and make the painting pop a little bit more using a bit of cadmium yellow and a touch of ultramarine will create this grain and add it primarily to the left side of the pair closest to the light source then we can use a bit of that cadmium yellow to start to lighten up some of the values again closest to the light source now that we have some of our greens in place we'll start to build up some of the Reds for this I'm going to use a mixture of burnt sienna with a touch of burnt umber this will create a nice earthy red we'll start on the bottom portion of the pair and start working our way up we can work right along that Terminator line where the darker value meets the mid-tone we'll even pull some of the color over the top of the Terminator lawn into some of the areas of darkest value we'll continue to lighten up areas that are closest to the light source again adding deliberate brushstrokes with thicker applications of the paint in speaking of lighter values we're just about ready to start developing the hot light on the pair we use a mixture of cadmium yellow with a touch of titanium white we'll start with a medium light application and then we'll progressively get lighter with these applications we'll also pull up some of this medium light to make sure to the upper portion of the pair as well for the most part we're sticking with mostly representational colors in other words we're sticking mainly with the colors that we see or observe from reality of course we're exploiting some of the color relationships by making the greens and Red's a little bit stronger but what's most important in a painting are the values we could make this pair any color that we wanted as long as the values that we create match the subject now we're adding a little bit of a stronger application of cadmium red again trying to push that color relationship between the reds and greens will continue doing the same thing on the bottom portion of the pair again close to the Terminator line you'll notice we're still sticking with this larger brush it may be tempting to switch over to a smaller brush but this might force you to start working with a more realistic style remember we want to keep our brushstrokes loose and expressive you'll also notice that loose doesn't necessarily mean fast as I mentioned before it may be easy to look at a painting that uses expressive brush stroking and think that the painting was created very quickly with just quick brush strokes but instead as you see here a painting like this is not necessarily created in a quick manner it's really just more of a deliberate approach where you're thinking about each one of your brush strokes and considering how they're going to play in with the final piece you can see here now that we're ready to make the highlight a bit stronger so we'll use our mixture of cadmium yellow and titanium white this time with just a bit more titanium white it may be tempting to use a pure white for your highlight but that will probably make your painting appear unnatural instead you typically want to use a lighter version of the color of the subject for now we'll move on to the stem of the pair and again with the larger brush we'll fill this in with a mixture of burnt umber and Prussian blue then we'll go back to the shadow and make it a bit stronger again with another application of Prussian blue and burnt umber if we want our shadow to appear a little bit cooler we'll simply use a little bit more Prussian blue if we want it to appear a bit warmer will use more burnt umber we'll go ahead and move on to the leaf that extends out from the stem and we'll just start with a mixture of ultramarine blue and a bit of cadmium yellow this mixture is dominated by the ultramarine which makes it appear a bit darker here again we'll concentrate on blocking and end the overall shapes of value that we see we'll start with the darker values and then we'll progressively get a little bit lighter by adding a bit more of the cadmium yellow in the mixture if you're having trouble locating the shapes of value it might be helpful to squint at your subject often when we squint our eyes the shapes of value become very clear and evident it does take a little bit of practice getting used to this it's easy to get overwhelmed by all the changes in value and tone that we see on a subject especially if it's a complicated subject and since we're simplifying the shapes of value to a certain degree it's especially important to be able to locate those shapes of value now we'll begin pushing the value relationships on the leaf we'll start by adding a bit of ultramarine to the areas of darkest value ultramarine is naturally darker in value but it's also a little bit cooler in color temperature then using a bit of cadmium yellow with a touch of titanium white we'll go back over the top of the lightest areas of the leaf we want to incorporate a few of the reds up in the leaf as well so we'll use a bit of burnt sienna in areas now we'll start to make the lights a bit stronger again with titanium white mixed with cadmium yellow and a touch of ultramarine as we continue to make applications in this area we'll gradually start to better understand the shapes of colour and value we'll continue working back and forth with darker applications and lighter applications also give a few indications of some of the veins and we'll finish off the stem you'll notice that I've switched over to a smaller flat brush for this up to this point have used the larger brush but this area is just too small to continue using the larger brush we'll add a bit of highlight to the left side of the stem and we'll also use the brush into the wet paint to pull out a few lighter veins then we'll continue to work on making some of the area's a little bit lighter and warmer in some of the areas a little bit cooler and darker now we'll reincorporate some of those reds that were lost with our applications this time it's a bit stronger with a bit of cadmium red mixed with burnt sienna we'll continue trying to find the right shape of tone and value before moving on to the area of cash atta now initially I'll add a cool grade to this location this is a mixture of Prussian blue and burnt umber with a touch of titanium white will make the cast shadow slightly stronger underneath the pair by using a bit more of the burnt umber and Prussian blue now we're ready to move on to addressing the background and for this particular painting I'm choosing to use a neutral background so that the colors of the pair will stand out a bit more we're going to use deliberate large brushstrokes here as well I'm using a mixture of titanium white with a bit of yellow ochre and a touch of burnt umber as we work our way around the body of the pair we'll define the edges we can also alter the edge or the shape of the pair in this case I want the edges to be a bit more angular so that they mimic the brushstrokes that were used in the body of the pair will allow some of our brushstrokes to overlap the shape of the cast shadow allowing for a smoother transition from dark to light we can also add a bit of variety in the background as well adding a bit more of our yellow ochre and burnt umber in areas and allowing the titanium white to dominate in other areas at this point I see that my shadow is a bit too strong once we've got our background color in place so we'll go back with a slightly lighter version of the color that we mixed before we'll go right up to the bottom edge of the pair and then again we'll darken the value again with our mixture of Prussian blue and burnt umber and now our loose expressive painting of a pair completed in under an hour is complete if you enjoyed this video that 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Channel: Drawing & Painting - The Virtual Instructor

Views: 98,306

Keywords: acrylic painting, brushstrokes, expressive, painting loosley, sketching, acrylics, beginners, still life, complimentary colors, painterly

Id: _n8nmkbykBc

Length: 16min 33sec (993 seconds)

Published: Wed Feb 14 2018