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Alright. So, I think I’ve finally decided, I’m ready to try my hand at this. Dick Blick’s got some art stuff in stock and on sale, and I have the money, so I think it’s time. But, I’m still dithering on what to actually buy as far as acrylic paints go.
I’m not an entire newbie to painting. I’ve done pottery glazing (high school and earlier), water colors (mostly college) and oil painting (mostly high school). I would not go so far as to say I’m highly skilled, but I understand the basics/am not a complete newbie. I’ve also done work with acrylics in high school and elementary, but it’s been *years* since I’ve done pyo with ceramics (not since elementary or middle school or so).
I would much rather invest in a higher grade of paint even though I’m getting my feet wet and don’t know if I will like this (though I suspect I will). So I’m wondering for someone with my background, do any of you guys have recommendations for which brand / body to work with, since acrylic comes in anything from high flow fluid to heavy body? I know Jennifer recommended the Golden Fluid acrylics for more experienced users, but everyone seems to have their own personal preference for what they like to work with best and I really don’t know if I qualify as “experienced.”
I took Jennifer’s recommendation for the Golden fluid acrylics, and I’m not that experienced a painter, but I really like how they work. They are super-concentrated so I recommend the GAC 100 and GAC 200 to thin them, and they dry lightning fast, so I recommend the retarder to extend the working time.
The one technique I know, is to start with a light, sometimes slightly metallic base coat, then add translucent layers of color on. It’s super-simple and gives the final piece a nice glow.
Most of what I use is the “cheap craft store acrylics” and they work fantastic for beginners and experienced in my opinion. I do have some select colors I like from golden and I even have quite a bit of Citadel because my boyfriend is big into miniatures and they have great coverage.
Starting out, Metallics are pretty easy to work with and give great finish results even for inexperienced painters.
A rule of thumb I use that gives me good results is when working with metallics (except for pastels and just very light colors in general) is starting with a black basecoat. Metallics tend to be the most forgiving paints with wet blending and/or drybrushing and a I think tend to go on much better on a black base.
I’d try that before diving into a lot of natural colors or flats. Not saying they are exceptionally hard to work with, but I just seem to find metallics are great to learn on to just “get your feet wet” per say.
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Dreamscape, Orion, Poison Dart, Fireberry, Spangler + Tigerberry DragonsI’m a big fan of Golden as well, and tend to use these for my base coating and to develop colors on the PYO. I also use some metallics, generally the DecoArt line from Michaels, but also the Lumiere line by Jacquard. I do a lot of layering, with the result that PYOs take a long time, but the results are often rewarding. 🙂 Metallics over a darker base coat (not necessarily black) add depth to the underlying color, but a transparent color glaze over the top really brings it to life.
Have fun, that’s the important thing!
Thanks so much for your comments so far guys!! They’re incredibly valuable to me, and I really appreciate it. For those of you who do have the Golden Fluid Acrylics, can you tell me if the 1 oz bottles are ample paint enough to do a couple of sculptures, provided I have the GAC 100 & 200 mixing materials and the drying retarder?
And thanks for all the advice about the metallics, too, that was another thing I hadn’t entirely made my mind up on yet (but now I think it’s a definite must.)
For those of you who do have the Golden Fluid Acrylics, can you tell me if the 1 oz bottles are ample paint enough to do a couple of sculptures, provided I have the GAC 100 & 200 mixing materials and the drying retarder?
Yes, easily. I’ve been in several swaps and have used it for several non-Windstone projects and still have plenty. It’s amazing how far twenty drops of GAC and 2-10 drops of paint in a bottlecap will go. (after the first coat of primer anyway… it’s amazing how much the raw gypsum will absorb.) I mostly lurk, but am looking forward to seeing your work. 🙂
For those of you who do have the Golden Fluid Acrylics, can you tell me if the 1 oz bottles are ample paint enough to do a couple of sculptures, provided I have the GAC 100 & 200 mixing materials and the drying retarder?
Yes, easily. I’ve been in several swaps and have used it for several non-Windstone projects and still have plenty. It’s amazing how far twenty drops of GAC and 2-10 drops of paint in a bottlecap will go. (after the first coat of primer anyway… it’s amazing how much the raw gypsum will absorb.) I mostly lurk, but am looking forward to seeing your work. 🙂
Ack, I hope I can come up with something worth sharing!! Everyone here is so seriously talented. 8| I may well be out of my league. ANYWAY! That’s great to hear that it’s plenty, with the GAC. Ahhhh I am getting so excited for this. Time to go see about placing that order~
Darn it. I’m really stumped on the polymer mixing fluids. I understand that they’re for extending the pigment, of course, but I don’t understand the purpose of GAC 200 as opposed to 100 (and is there a difference between using that and a varnish finish?) and I’m also running into the problem that Golden’s GAC 100 is out of stock at the moment. I don’t want to have to wait, but I also don’t know what might be a good alternative. Does anyone have any thoughts?
Also, do people use anything special for priming, or just a bottom layer of black or white paint? (Since I know the gypsum apparently just soaks it all in initially.)
The Golden paints are about the best quality in terms of pigment load, quality, polymer suspension, etc.
That said, craft paints work just fine too. It matters what your budget and preference is. They do work up a bit differently. Some folks here, like Drag0n, use them to beautiful results. I just have to worry about archival properties, etc, so I use the Goldens.You will find that the 1oz bottles will last for MANY PYOs if you do not overpour them. By this I mean as long as you don’t squirt a ton out on to your working palette each time. They go a long, long way. I still have a few of the original bottles of lesser used colors… from 2006. Interference colors especially last a long time if you don’t use a lot of them. Very thin coats create the sparkle and the pigments are rich enough to make up for lack of volume.
I think you would be happiest with how the GAC 100 works. I’m sorry it’s out of stock. The GAC 200 isn’t terribly different, it just makes the paint more… hard? Not brittle. It’s not as nice to work into the paint to extend it as the GAC 100 though. That said, it is also not necessary unless you like to do lots of thin glazes, like I do. Everyone works differently!
Depending on your method, some like to prime the piece with white (Will make colors more pure if using rich colors) or black (will make interference colors POP). Or not at all. Have you considered getting a muse, or a foo pup, to experiment on?
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My art: featherdust.comAlso, do people use anything special for priming, or just a bottom layer of black or white paint? (Since I know the gypsum apparently just soaks it all in initially.)
I may be a little unconventional, but I’ve had some luck in using the Liquiitex Acrylic Spray color paints for priming. I’ve used their Carbon Black, Cadmium Red Med.Hue, Chromium Oxide Green, and Cadmium Orange Hue 2 for pieces. They dry flat and take other paints nicely. I don’t have an Air Brush, so I hand brush everything except my base coat… so for me this is almost like a ‘Poor Man’s Air Brush’ … well, for the base coat anyway. 🙂
If you do use the spray color for a base, spray it lightly and add more only if you still need to. If sprayed to much, it will accumulate way too much and fill in details and drip. I’ve even used this technique to get some preliminary color blocking in. I did this with my ‘Leaf Dragon’ Swap last year and another ‘Autumn Leaf’ Keeper I’m currently working on for myself.
For painting, I’m still doing some experimenting, but I’ve mainly used the Liquitex BASIC Acrylic paints with Iridescent Medium to make the colors translucent, Sargent Art Liquid Metal paints, and the Lumiere Metallic paints. I LOVE using the Lumiere Metallic paints by Jacquard – the only thing I wish they had available was a more ‘Red-Red’ color in the Metallics. I can’t seem to find a good one that can be used straight out of the bottle. I’ve also used the ‘Folk Art’ paint line from Michael’s for some of the speciality finishes – such as their Antiquing Medium.
Some other GREAT information that helped me was this Forum post by KoishiiKitty: http://windstoneeditions.com/forum/brand-names-list
It has TONS of Great tips and information on paint brands as well as finishes, brushes, etc. I’ve bookmarked it for future reference and I keep going back to it … Like you I had painted ceramics and figurines in years past, and then I found this wonderful site. I decided to start painting again when I saw all of the Wonderful PYO pieces! Don’t worry… you’ll do fine. My first PYO was done for last Fall’s PYO Swap, and it turned out really well, so you might surprise yourself.
Good Luck with your painting! 😀
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*** Come visit me on deviantArt at http://ela-hara.deviantart.comI went from craft paints to Winsor and Newton Galeria acrylics (they are student grade) to Liquitex Soft Body to Golden Fluid acrylics. Without a doubt, Golden was the best brand I tried, however, having the “best” might not be your primary consideration. Jennifer’s break down of the brands in the link provided is pretty dead on. There is going to be a trade off between quality and price. I’d suggest buying the paints that are at a price you are comfortable paying. This shouldn’t be stressful or break the bank, but fun =) The small bottles of 1 oz Golden paints do go a long way though, so that shouldn’t be much of a concern. I do recommend Golden’s GAC 100, if you are willing to wait for it to be restocked. It’s a versatile medium. I actually gave some bottles of it as Christmas gifts to two individuals who I knew were starting out in acrylics.
I may be a little unconventional, but I’ve had some luck in using the Liquiitex Acrylic Spray color paints for priming.
Ha, I was wondering if anyone besides me had tried the Liquitex acrylic spray paints. I got the white and unbleached titanium on sale. I used the white as a base coat for my last PYO. I really like the evenness and silkiness of the finish afterwards. My only problem was the amount of overspray. I sprayed indoors in my attic, in a huge box, then had a plastic painters tarp attached to the ceiling behind, and still found evidence of the spray getting around it.
I’ve used the same Golden 1oz bottles on something like 8 PYOs now. The only color I ran out of is white because I use it a LOT for mixing. I’d recommend a larger bottle of white, but smaller bottles of everything else is just fine. 🙂
I was actually thinking about getting two of the small foo pups for experimenting / working out the ‘I-don’t-know-what-I’m-doing’ feeling. XD I guess really as far as the medium goes, I was wondering if anyone had tried using liquitex medium with the Golden paints instead. If pretty much everyone says that the GAC 100 is worth waiting for, perhaps I’ll just order that separate.
I should be able to avoid breaking the bank and still be able to get myself some reasonably nice paints. 🙂 I’ll just have to work with a smaller range of colors, maybe, for a while and try mixing in some of the pearlescent stuff liquitex makes into normal flats instead of working with a whole range of metallics. Just cheaper that way.
I only have a small handful of colors – I generally just mix. I have both Liquidex and Golden mediums and honestly I can’t tell the difference in terms of ‘feel’.
Of course, I am not much of an artist or PYO painter so that might be part of it! 🙂 I have a pearlescent medium, a couple gloss mediums, and a metallic medium.
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