Protect and enhance your artwork: A step-by-step guide to varnishing your painting for a lasting finish.
It was a large portrait on hardboard, about 48″ tall. Having just done some mural work with a well known muralist, I attempted to copy his method of using a household paint roller and a clear coat.
It was a disaster.
The medium looked so milky white while it was drying, that I started to panic like Rowan Atkinson did in the movie “Bean” when he sneezed on Whistler’s Mother. I tried to clean off the half dried medium with a damp towel. To my dismay, the medium started globbing up and totally distorted the fine detail work on the surface. Some areas had no varnish. Other areas were covered with a streaky, bumpy film. My painting was a hideous mess.
I said I would never varnish a painting again.
Except that I did.
I knew I needed to learn how to do it correctly in order to protect my paintings from dust and debris, saturate the colors and dark values more, and give it a uniform finish.
What I’m going to teach you is the process I learned basically from trial and error over the years.
I’m not scared to varnish any more. But I like to say a quick prayer before I put brush to canvas, because if you don’t varnish correctly, you can mess up a good painting very quickly!
Here’s a video that will show you the correct way to do it…
Here are the steps, simplified.
Use acrylic matte varnish. Not matte medium. (unless you want a flat finish) Matte varnish dries to a satin sheen and looks fantastic. If you want a little more saturation on your dark values and colors, you can add some gloss medium to your matte varnish and mix them together very thoroughly.
Put your painting on a flat table, or slightly angled. Don’t varnish the painting on a vertical easel or you could get drips and it will look terrible.
Use a 1″ or larger flat brush that’s in good condition. Put your varnish in a cup or container than is wide enough to accommodate the brush.
Dip the brush into the varnish and apply from top down, left to right, overlapping slightly. Do not overbrush!
Continue the process all the way down and when you’re done, leave it alone for a couple hours. It should dry completely clear.
That’s all there is to it!
What do you think? What are YOUR experiences with varnishing? Do you have any stories–or tips–to share? Do you avoid varnishing completely?
P.S. Did you find this post helpful or encouraging? If so, send it on ahead! Let others know with the share buttons below. I’d love to hear your comments. Thank you so much! Also, do you have a question on acrylic portrait painting you’d like answered? Let me know, and I’d be happy to help!
One of the most important aspects of acrylic portrait painting is setting up your palette.
It’s often overlooked, but having a palette setup that works well for you can minimize frustration, increase productivity, reduce paint costs, and even enhance accuracy in your portrait.
Recently, an artist asked me how I set up my palette. Of course, there’s many ways to do it.
I’m not going to say the way I do it is the right way, but it works for me. And it may work for you as well.
I use a traditional wood palette–about 14″ wide and 18″ long. I customized it a bit by adding a lip to the edge. That keeps my matte medium from dripping off the side. The lip is thick chipboard about 2″ in width that I bent and glued onto the wood. Then I sealed it with gloss medium to keep the moisture from warping it.
Let me help you get started on your new portrait today…
Before I start a new painting, I put aluminum foil over the entire surface, and attach it securely to back of the palette with clear packaging tape. It holds very well.
Then I lay out my paints.
I keep them wet as I can with a spray bottle of water while I work, spraying them about every 15 minutes or so.
When my mixing area gets too full of paint, I add a fresh piece of aluminum foil over the area, folding it over slightly to conform to the rounded shape of the palette. The previous layer of wet paint holds it down. This way I am not wasting paint. All my main colors on the palette remain until my painting is done or they dry up.
I throw the discarded, soiled pieces of aluminum foil away in a bag and then I get paid for them when I recycle them with my aluminum cans. And it doesn’t pollute the environment either!
Here is a video where I explain further how to set this palette up…
Question: What do you use for your palette…and why?
Enjoy your portrait painting and let me know if I can help you in any way.
All the best,
P.S. Did you find this post helpful or encouraging? If so, send it on ahead! Let others know with the share buttons below. I’d love to hear your comments. Thank you so much! Also, do you have a question on acrylic portrait painting you’d like answered? Let me know, and I’d be happy to help!
Transform your studio with the essential lighting tips for every artist
For acrylic portrait painters and all artists, there is a truth we can’t hide from: we can only paint as well as we can see
So, how well are we seeing in our art studios?
Here’s a question I got from one of my art students:
“I would like to paint in the evening but find out the next day my skin tones are off. I have the room overhead a one lamp with the daylight bulb but doesn’t seem to be enough. I do have cataracts which may be part of the problem but can’t have that fixed until next year. You said you currently have no windows in your studio so what do you use for good lighting? I’m sorry to bother you with a question like this but I was quite upset this morning to see what I did last night!”
Thanks so much and God Bless.
Sharon
Here’s my answer:
Hi Sharon,
It’s annoying to not have enough light. I remember when I first started painting, I would work with those old yellowish incandescent bulbs. When I took my painting outside to photograph it I said, “That’s NOT how it looked in my studio!” The colors were off, and it looked grainy.
Now with LED bulbs being so inexpensive (to buy and to run) I have 10 lights in my studio with 100 watt-equivalent daylight spectrum bulbs. Best part is they only use 14 watts a piece, so it’s pretty energy efficient!
They are simple clamp-style lamps with metal reflectors that you can buy at your home improvement store for about $5-10 a piece. You don’t even have to buy them all at once. You can do it like I did. Every time I ran to Menards, I would buy another lamp. I spaced it out over the course of a couple years!
Here is a shot of my messy, well-used studio with the lights aimed at the ceiling. The reflected light works great to illuminate even a large painting. While I’m working there are virtually no shadows from my hands and arms to interfere with my painting.
I do have a window in my studio now, but it doesn’t do a lot. It’s mostly the light bubs that illuminate everything for me.
P.S. Did you find this post helpful or encouraging? If so, send it on ahead! Let others know with the share buttons below. I’d love to hear your comments. Thank you so much! Also, do you have a question on acrylic portrait painting you’d like answered? Let me know, and I’d be happy to help!
Learn the art of skin tones: A step-by-step guide for realistic acrylic portraits
What do you MOST want to learn?
This is a question I asked the artists in my Facebook group. The #1 answer was skin tones.
So I decided to put together a 5-week live video class, showing the whole process of painting an acrylic portrait, step-by-step, concentrating on flesh tones.
Most people know me as the guy that does slow, methodical glazes. But in this series, I wanted to meet artists where they’re at and do the portrait in more of an opaque technique. We had a great response to the class, with about eighty students on board right away during the first lesson!
I decided to create a printable guide that shows what we covered during the classes, although obviously not in as much depth as you’d get out of watching 5 hours of video! I think you’ll find this guide helpful. This online tutorial is an adaptation of the guide, showing a portrait from a photo I painted of my wife. If you take the video course (now open for enrollment) it will complement it well, and give you something to keep next to your easel as you paint. It can stand on its own, too. If you put the techniques to practice, you’ll see improvement in your portrait painting, for sure.
Either way, enjoy this tutorial, and I look forward to teaching you more!
Step 1: Create a Basic Sketch
To begin your portrait, just fill in the outlines of the face. Don’t draw in the features. All you need is enough information to know where to block in the color. You can sketch it freehand if you’re comfortable with the process, or grid if necessary.
Step 2: Block in the Hair Color and Value
Although we are concentrating on skin tones, quickly blocking in the hair color and value frames the face. It will help us determine what colors to use for the skin tone, and make sure it is accurate. When you paint on top of plain white, you will think your skin tone is too dark, when in reality it’s not. We look for the predominant color in the hair. In this example, I’m using raw umber dark, and applying with a 3/4” -1” flat brush.
Step 3: Fill in the Skin Tone Base
In this step, I’m using a mixture of titanium white, burnt sienna, and organic red orange for the first, foundational skin tone layer. Make the paint as fluid as you can, by adding a little matte medium (10%) and brush quickly, just filling the whole area in.
Print off Your Own Guide to Paint Realistic Skin Tones in Acrylic
I created a handy reference guide that covers all the steps in this article in a 7 page PDF. You can download it right now, print it, and set it next to your easel, so you know exactly what colors, what techniques and what steps to take when you paint skin tones on your portrait. Download it below…
Now it’s time to get the fun part: actually painting in the facial features–the eyes, nose and mouth. But we don’t want to paint them too dark right away. Lightly “suggest” them in using a mixture of the skin tone base from the previous layer and burnt sienna. Painting the features this way at first will allow you to adjust them if necessary.
Step 5: Darken and Refine the Features
After the facial features dry, you can go over them with a darker color. Just add a little more burnt sienna for the eyebrows and nose. For the eyes, a bit of raw umber will cool down the color enough so that if the eyes are a different color than brown, you can easily adjust it. We’re not trying to dial in the exact eye color; rather, we’re just trying to ger the main shape and value established. For the lips, in this case, I’m using napthol red and burnt sienna, diluted a bit by the main flesh tone color.
Step 6: Block in the Mid-tone Shadows
Unless we add in shadows on the face, it will look flat. That is obvious. The trick is to use the right color and value. And then to place that tone in the right places to give the illusion of three dimensionality, In my example, I use a similar color to what I used for the previous step, and lightened it up just a bit with the main skin tone color, so it’s easy to control and doesn’t get too dark.
Step 7: Refine the Eyebrows
The eyebows up to this point look too thin. So what I’m doing here is creating a mixture of raw umber dark, alizarine crimson, raw sienna, and a touch of burnt sienna. Then, I carefully go over the eyebrow areas, and also thicken them up a bit too. You have to think of the eyebrows not just as hairs but also the shadow under the eye socket. What we’re doing is actually painting the base tone for the eyebrows. Then we go over with a darker color to suggest the hairs.
Tired of Muddy Colors?
Get my complete guide on painting skin tones, for free, and start mixing and blending realistic skin tones right away…
The eyes also need to get darker. So I take some raw umber dark, alizarine crimson and mix it into some of the skin tone base. Next, I paint that slowly with a small round brush, suggesting her eyelashes, eyeliner, and even the thickness of her eyelids.
Step 9: Turn the Form
“Turning the form” means we bring out the three-dimensionality of the facial structure by placing shading and gradation in just the right spots. In this step, I use a color just slightly darker than the main skin tone and add more depth to her chin. In addition, I deepen some of the shadows alongside her nose, and under her eyes, to make the cheeks appear as if they are projecting forward in space a little bit.
Step 10: Refine the Teeth Details
Establishing the shadows on the sides of the teeth gives the jaw three-dimensionality. That’s what we want. I use raw umber, titanium white, and a bit of alizarine crimson. For the highlights, I use titanium white and a bit of raw sienna. You can use a size 10 round brush if you twist the end to a point with paint that is fluid enough. Spray your paint with a mist of water, if necessary, to achieve that.
Step 11: Add Highlights and Final Touches
We also added highlights in some of the previous steps too, but toward the end of the painting is where you can really make it shine with great use of high- lights. The colors will vary depending on what part of the face they are applied to. The forehead high- lights have some titanium white and alizarine crimson mixed in, to suggest the cool color of window light shining, in addition to incandescent lamps.
Step 12: Finished–Enjoy Your Painting!
Now, it’s your turn! Paint with this guide and let me know how it’s helped you!
I enjoyed creating this helpful reference on painting realistic skin tones in acrylic. I know that if you put the steps into practice, you will see a dramatic improvement on your portrait painting, especially if you’re just starting out. If you found this helpful, would you send me an email and let me know? I can be reached at [email protected].
Make you print off the skin tones guide so you can paint a lifelike portrait you can be proud to show. Click the button below to download it.
I have a video course available which shows each step I covered in this guide in greater detail. The course is about 5 hours long, and it’s a total package of five workshops that you can watch, step-by-step, at your own convenience. To learn more visit: Courses.realisticacrylic.com Even if you aren’t able take the course, be sure to get the free printable reference guide on painting skin tones in acrylic. Email me if you have a question or need a quick tip. I’ll be happy to help.
Acrylic portrait artist Matt Philleo posing next to a painting of his wife, painted for the Paint Realistic Skin Tones in Acrylic online class, teaching you how to paint with step-by-step lessons.
Let your fellow artists know about Realistic Acrylic Portrait School. My desire is to help artists learn how to paint an acrylic portrait they can be proud of. As I do for all my students, I pray that God would bless you with His peace in your painting process, direct your brush-strokes, that your paintings would encourage those who seem them, and that you would have all the provision you need, as your heart is drawn to Him, in Jesus’ name, Amen.
Blessings to you!
P.S. Did you find this post helpful or encouraging? If so, send it on ahead! Let others know with the share buttons below. I’d love to hear your comments. Thank you so much! Also, do you have a question on acrylic portrait painting you’d like answered? Let me know, and I’d be happy to help!
Sometimes as portrait artists, we are called to capture the memory of a lost loved one. It’s a very special thing, a privilege that we given, to be able to do that for someone.
I don’t take it lightly.
Recently, I just finished up a commissioned portrait for a friend, whose pastor has recently passed away. This is an 11″ x 14″ acrylic on canvas. I want to show you the entire process, but I’m going to start in this post with just the sketch and first couple layers. Then, we’ll just add on with more steps to this same post.
Many of my blog readers prefer more video content rather than written, so that’s how I’m going to do it here.
Hope you enjoyed this acrylic portrait painting tutorial. As always, let me know how I can help you with your portraits or if you have a question. Leave me a comment below!
Be blessed in your painting,
P.S. Did you find this post helpful or encouraging? If so, send it on ahead! Let others know with the share buttons below. I’d love to hear your comments. Thank you so much! Also, do you have a question on acrylic portrait painting you’d like answered? Let me know, and I’d be happy to help!
What is the best way to get better as an acrylic portrait artist?
Is it by learning a new skin tone recipe? Is it by getting a new glazing medium? Or is it by watching a bunch of time-lapse videos?
All of these things can help, but what will get you the fastest results is to go to the foundation: accurate drawing. Most painters spent months or even years doing drawings before ever picking up a paintbrush. There’s just something about drawing that works wonders for your painting skills.
I think part of it is that it bypasses the other concerns of handling paint: mixing colors, brush technique, drying times, etc. You only have a few simple tools: your pencils, paper, and an eraser. And you work in monochromatic so it forces you to think only about your form and shading.
Portrait artist Matt Philleo sketching from a photo
So, why do I have a drawing tutorial here in Realistic Acrylic Portrait School? Because drawing is a fundamental skill, and it will drastically improve your painting. It won’t help to learn advanced skin tone and shading skills unless you know how to see three-dimensional forms and translate them to a two-dimensional surface. You want to be able to see the likeness of the person you’re trying to paint and accurately capture that. Drawing will do this for you faster than anything.
One of my neighbor’s friends’ sister died recently, and she asked me if I could draw a sketch of her to commemorate her. I agreed, and when I had some time in my crazy studio schedule, I got out my paper, and pencils and started sketching.
I set up the photo on my Kindle Fire, right next to my paper and started working. Now this drawing is definitely not fancy since it’s just a sketch done in under an hour, but I try to draw freehand often, to keep my skills sharp. I’m still learning, and trying to improve my skills.
Here is a a free training session showing how I drew the 11″ x 14″ pencil portrait, from start to finish, in about 45-50 minutes. In this video, you will learn:
How to decide how big to make the face and get the initial proportions
How to accurately position draw the shape of the features by working loosely at first and getting specific later
Techniques for shading in the face to give it dimension
Why it’s important not to blend too much
And more!
If you regularly do freehand drawings like this, you will find your painting skills will improve too.
Have a blessed day,
P.S. Did you find this post helpful or encouraging? If so, send it on ahead! Let others know with the share buttons below. I’d love to hear your comments. Thank you so much! Also, do you have a question on acrylic portrait painting you’d like answered? Let me know, and I’d be happy to help!
If you’re like me, printing off reference photos for painting a portrait is a major inconvenience.
You have to run to the photo developer and get them printed off, hoping they turn out ok, then tape them up next to your canvas, and struggle with them falling off. Or you try to print your own from your own computer and it costs you an arm and a leg in ink.
I got tired of it.
I asked for a Kindle Fire for Christmas and got one. Photos look outstanding in it.
I knew I wanted to set it up next to my canvas, but how would I get it to stay there? I thought of attaching a wire to the ceiling but that sounded sketchy.
So I made my own contraption to hold it up out of cardboard. If said this before, but if wasn’t an artist, I’d be a “mad scientist” inventor like Doc Brown from Back to the Future! The thing I made to hold my Kindle worked great.
One of my students saw it in a video and said she was having “technology envy.” 🙂 She thought the idea was cool. So I figured, why not share this with my students?
I explain more about it and how it can help you in my video below…
Hope this helps in your painting endeavors. Would you like step by step instructions on how to build one for yourself? Here is a free video course that will show you how!
P.S. Did you find this post helpful or encouraging? If so, send it on ahead! Let others know with the share buttons below. I’d love to hear your comments. Thank you so much! Also, do you have a question on acrylic portrait painting you’d like answered? Let me know, and I’d be happy to help!
Transitioning from your sketch in an acrylic portrait can be difficult.
In this video tutorial, I want to show you how to set the stage for a painting with luminosity, by using light glazes.
Glazes are simply mixtures of paint and clear medium (matte medium) and usually at least 50% medium to paint ratio. By building them up slowly, you can steer the portrait in the right direction, incrementally.
You will see how color is applied to the entire painting, and it starts coming alive, even if slowly.
It’s a different way to look at painting. I’ll show you how I do it in this video, using this recent 8″ x 10″ commissioned portrait as an example…
Hope you enjoyed this tutorial and have a blessed day,
P.S. Did you find this post helpful or encouraging? If so, send it on ahead! Let others know with the share buttons below. I’d love to hear your comments. Thank you so much! Also, do you have a question on acrylic portrait painting you’d like answered? Let me know, and I’d be happy to help!
Unlock the secrets of color and value: a step-by-step guide to acrylic portrait painting
Creating a beautiful acrylic portrait involves several steps, and one of the most crucial is blocking in colors and values. This stage establishes the foundation for your painting, allowing you to build layers of detail and depth. In this blog post, we will delve into the process of blocking in colors and values, drawing insights from me.
What is the best way to start an acrylic portrait?
Do you just begin with a white canvas, and fully paint everything from left to right, as you would in a drawing?
That’s how I used to paint, until I learned the glazing technique. I would painstakingly render every detail, and move across the surface of the canvas. But I always had a lot of white canvas staring me in the face.
After learning the glazing technique, instead, I could begin to slowly develop the portrait, like an Polaroid photograph.
Psychologically, it felt less intimidating. And it was fun to watch the process of the painting methodically taking shape.
In this video tutorial today, I’m going to show you how I begin my painting–what colors I use, where I put them and why, using this 16″ x 20″ commissioned portrait of three children…
Hopefully, this may provide you with a different approach to acrylic portrait painting, especially if you’re used to simply covering your painting opaquely across the surface of the canvas.
Let me know how this tutorial helps!
P.S. Did you find this post helpful or encouraging? If so, send it on ahead! Let others know with the share buttons below. I’d love to hear your comments. Thank you so much! Also, do you have a question on acrylic portrait painting you’d like answered? Let me know, and I’d be happy to help!
You have some time to paint over the weekend. You set up your reference photo, knock out a nice looking sketch, and then excitedly start to paint…
But something happens.
After a few layers, things start to unravel. Suddenly, it just doesn’t look like the person you’re trying to do a portrait of anymore. You paint some more in an attempt to restore what you lost in the sketch, and now you’ve only made it worse!
Frustration sets in.
Can I fix this painting? Or do I have to start over? How much time did I spend on this already?
I had exactly this question asked of me by a student…
I can get a good likeness with the sketch but I seem to lose lots of the likeness after a few layers of paint. What do you think happens? –Ron
My answer back to him will be the basis for this article today. I think it will benefit you as well, if you have lost your likeness after sketching. I know I have!
Here’s some tips to prevent the likeness in your sketch from being lost in your painting and also, how to get it back on track if you do.
1. Seal in Your Sketch
I know this sounds simple, but if you just start painting over pencil the thick paint on your brush will lift off some of the pigment on your canvas and it will smear. The end result is a muddy mix of paint and pigment and lost detail.
First of all, use colored pencil instead of graphite pencil to do your sketch. Burnt ochre or a similar color works best. Then carefully seal in the sketch with a wide synthetic bristle brush and matte medium.
Once it’s dry you will have a barrier between your sketch and your paint.
2. Paint Lightly at First
When you start your actual painting process, I recommend to use thin glazes of paint (tiny bits of paint mixed with generous portions of matte medium) and gently block in the color and value. You want to just barely see the change between the white canvas and the color you’re putting down at first.
Then, as you add more layers and depth, you can get aggressive with your paint. (At least compared to how you start out!) In the beginning, you’ll use a ratio of 90% medium to 10% paint and then later, closer to 50-50.
By going light, you will preserve the detail of your sketch beneath. Only toward the middle to the end of the painting process will the sketch get completely covered up.
3. Convert Pencil Lines to Paint
Paint over the details of your sketch intermittently with round brushes as you paint the large areas with your flat brush. It will be a constant push-and pull between blocking in large areas of value and color, and fussy detail work. Toward the end of the painting you will be favoring more of the detail aspect of your painting.
As you darken in some of these pencil lines, you’ll ensure you don’t lose that valuable detail that you laid out in the sketching stage while applying large layers.
If you’d like to learn more, sign up to receive my portrait painting tips via email. I’ll send you video lessons to show you how to paint a realistic portrait in acrylic step-by-step!
Remember that it is shading and value–those differences between light and dark with all the subtle variations–that describe a three dimensional illusion on a two-dimensional surface.
Lines can’t do that.
Only shading can.
The lines in our sketch are there to tell us where to put the shading in during the painting process. And if you do some shading during the sketching process, even better. Then you’ll be able to just enhance those areas with paint.
It is the shading (the use of value) that tells us how large someone’s chin is, or the roundness of their nose, or fullness of their cheek, or boniness of their forehead.
So, my point is this: do some shading on your sketch, and that will help your painting process along.
5. You Will Lose the Likeness to Some Degree
That’s normal. Happens to me all the time when I paint. Knowing this ahead of time will clear your mind of unrealistic expectations so that your frustration level can go down…and you can paint to the best of your ability.
The reason that the likeness inevitably does get lost is that as you’re adding these various values in different places, there will be some spots on your painting that are just less finished than others. You may have painted the eyes about as dark as they are in the reference photo, but the eyebrows haven’t “caught up” yet.
Or maybe you added some deep shadows under the chin, but you haven’t quite dialed in the shading for the cheeks. If the person’s chubby cheeks are a main part of their features, then missing this aspect can really throw off the likeness.
And this can go for parts all over the face.
I am working on a painting right now of three children as I write this blog post, and the likenesses aren’t quite there yet. In fact, they look “off” to me. But I know that if I stick with it, it will work out. I prayed that God would help me to do it well, and I believe He will.
However, as in all of life, there’s a struggle we have to go through to get to the other side. You can’t have the mountains without the valleys. So, I’ll stick with this, keep looking at my reference photo, keep praying and putting paint on the canvas.
And the end result, by God’s grace, will be a fantastic painting that the client will love.
So for you, this means that as you bring all the unfinished areas of your portrait to completion, eventually, the likeness will not only get restored to how it was during your sketch, but it will be even better.
6. Get Critiques of Your Work
When you’ve tried the other tips and you feel like your painting is way off track you may want to consider getting a critique. If you have an artist group where you meet in person, that may be a good way to go. I have a Facebook group as well if you need some quick feedback. If you haven’t already, I invite you to join the group. The folks there are very helpful.
Also, I do personal, one-to-one video critiques that you will show you precisely what you need to do to fix problem areas of your painting. Learn more here.
7. Start Over…If You Must
I don’t recommend starting over a painting, except as a last resort. I think it’s much better to stick with a painting and resolve problem areas to build confidence in your skills as an artist and to save time and money.
But if you find yourself sinking way too much time into the painting, reworking the same area over and over, and the texture is built up so much that you want to sand it off, it may be time to start over.
If the painting is in the beginning stages, and the composition or likeness was wrong from the start, then re-doing it may be the best choice. It may take less time to just start over than try to rectify your mistakes. You’ll have to look at your painting and ask yourself “how far off is it?” Sometimes we get hard on ourselves as artists (we’re perfectionists by nature) and it might be just a tiny thing that can make all the difference.
I had a painting like that. It just didn’t look like the guy. Then I added a reflection on his eye that took all of one minute to paint–and that did it. It was him!
So, get a second opinion with a good critique, and then you’ll know if it’s worth it to start over. The person critiquing your may be able to give you an idea of how far off the rails you are. You may be closer that you think!
And there you have it: 7 tips to help you how to not lose your likeness, or if you do, how to get it back. Let me know how this helps!
Blessings to you and your painting,
P.S. Did you find this post helpful or encouraging? If so, send it on ahead! Let others know with the share buttons below. I’d love to hear your comments. Thank you so much! Also, do you have a question on acrylic portrait painting you’d like answered? Let me know, and I’d be happy to help!
