Artists Info

This blog is for artists Both beginners and pro's alike. It covers Oil and SprayCan Art. from an Artist that has been painting for over 30 years. It is a Blog you should keep returning to as Information will be added on a regular basis. If you have any Questions please ask. If you have any answers to any of the questions that are posted here you are welcome to answer them.http://spraycanart.us/forum/Blah.pl

Lets Talk Art

Thursday, May 28, 2009

Today we will discuss Oil Paint.

Oil paint has been around for centuries. Oil paints are very popular as they are so forgiving. For example, If and when mistakes are made the paint can be removed with out damage to the substrate being painted on.
The basic ingredients of oil paint, The oil itself, there are many and varied oils that can be used and each has it's own unique property. The most common oil is linseed oil also called a binder because it brings all the ingredients together. Cold pressed is best is best because of it's low viscosity and good wetting ability. Also expensive to manufacture there for expensive to buy. Other oils that are used are safflower, poppyseed and soybean oil. All do different things some make the paint dry slower and are a good additive if using wet on wet style of painting that I use. Do not use more than 5 to 10% of the total volume.
Driers
Driers are added to oil paint to produce a range of hues that have similar drying times. Again these are best left to large manufactures. as dryers can over time cause paint to crack and yellow. One of the best Driers I have used is when I left some standard linseed oil out in the sun to thicken. Each night I would bring it in and cover it. it has worked well and one of the painting that I painted a little over 12 years ago has not to date yellowed or cracked. Again use no more than 5%.
Stabilizers we will not go into them here as they are not to be added unless you are a paint manufacturer. Just to add to this some small paint makers use 2 to 3% beeswax to help bind some of the difficult pigments together.
Pigments. Sometimes it can be an advantage to add pigments to give them a more opaque. Again use only the smallest amount at a time. Also I can not stress this enough Please use extrem caustion as they are very fine powers and some of them are toxic use face masks eye protection and gloves.
It is best to use good quality paint at all times you can get away using cheeper brushes and even a cheeper substrate to paint on. With Paint you get most of the time what you pay for.
If however you would like to try and make your own paint please contact me and I will email you a not to difficalt formular.
Keep Painting Keep Happy. Barry.

Artists Info