ACRYLIC LANDSCAPES with a Painting Knife. Beginners Level 1

1. Welcome to Course: welcome to this acrylic landscapes course level one where you will learn how to paint this simple landscape, using just three primary colors and a painting knife. Hello, my name is Gerald. Andi. I'll be leading you through this course. I was a lecturer for six years at the School of Art Design and Media with the West Australian Department of Training. Andi. I've been painting landscapes and abstracts in oils, acrylics and pastors for many years. I've also run many landscape and abstract workshops for groups, couples and individuals. I've created this course for students who want to learn to paint Impressionist style landscapes without getting bogged down into doing lots of fine detail. Students who are new to landscape painting can often fall into the trap of using small brushes on this Kenly lead into painting that looked tight and controlled. This is where the painting knife can really help. I'll be covering the primary colors you'll need some basic materials on. I'll be demonstrating the painting knife technique for mixing on applying the paint to your canvas. The ideal student for this course is a beginner starting their journey into landscape painting or maybe a student with some previous experience who has become frustrated because they're using just too many colors on that paintings aren't working. There are no requirements necessary to enroll. Just come with an open mind. Bring your enthusiasm on. Enjoy this fun and creative process. Have a look at the course description. Watch the next introduction video on. I look forward to helping you get started. 2. Introduction: Hi, I'm Jerald, and I'm really looking forward to showing you how to paint this hillside landscape. Using a painting knife is a great way to keep your painting loose on. Also, it can help you to create Impressionist style paintings that looked fresh with a bold approach. You will see how effective it can be to limit yourself to using just three primary colors on Dwight. It's a really great discipline to start with, and you will learn farm or about killin mixing than having lots of tubes off premixed colors. I've created this hillside landscape composition to keep it simple, especially if you are starting your journey into landscape painting. Even if you have some previous experience, you will benefit from doing this because you might not have used a painting life before and restricted yourself to using three primary colors. I've broken this whole painting process down into a series of easy, step by step videos that you can follow along with me at your own pace. And in the next video, I'm going to cover the three acrylic primary colors and some basic materials that you'll need to get started 3. Painting Materials: let's now have a look at the basic materials and paints that you're going to need to do this landscape if you are just starting out and obviously on a bit of a budget, these canvas panels are absolutely ideal. They are economical. You will be able to pick them up from your local art supply or discount store. They come ready prime so you can paint immediately. Straight on top of them, eight inches by 12 inches. Visa ideal. Now that you have your canvas panel ready to paint on, how are you going to support it? The first option is simply to place it on top of a dining room table or a kitchen table top so that you can stand and paint directly on top of your canvas. But if you're really serious about wanting to pursue your painting either using oils or acrylics, it will be well worth your while investing in a tabletop easel. Just like this, they come in a number of different sizes. The advantage is that this angle is adjustable either when you're standing or sitting painting on also this ledge, you can put up and down because it will take a number of different sized canvases on The great advantage is that you can fold it up and put it away once you finished. The next item on your list is a palette when you can lay out your killers and you have a smooth surface to mix your paint with your painting knife and apply it to your canvas again . If you are just starting out and on a bit of a budget, just get yourself a plastic tray just like this. It has raised edge all the way around. Keeps the paint on on. It's absolutely ideal because it is smooth ideal for mixing your pain because you need to then scraped the paint off with your knife and put it on the canvas. Extremely economical on. You will be able to pick up one of these at your local discount store. This landscape demonstration was done using just three primary colors on Dwight, although I used my artist acrylic colors. If you're just starting and you don't have any, there is nothing wrong with student quality colors that economical to use, and it means you can play around with them and you can mix and just see what you can achieve with them. Now Here are the three colors that you're going to need for this course. Ultra Marine Blue Elizabeth in crimson, cadmium, yellow and white. Now we come to one of my favorite painting tools apart from my brushes, and that is the painting knife. This acrylic landscape course is all about using the painting knife to paint this picture. Now you'll notice that a painting knife, unlike a conventional flat knife, has a croaked handle on that is so that you can actually mix your paint on a palette, scrape it up and then apply it to your painting. This is a medium size painting knife. They do come in a variety of different shapes and sizes, but this was used to paint this particular painting on. You'll be able to purchase one of these again from your local art supplies whilst you're using your painting knife. It's a really good idea to have a supply of tissues handy so that you can keep your knife clean from time to time. As you're mixing your various colors, you don't want to infect them by just moving your knife randomly from one color to the next washed your mixing, so ensure you have a good supply of tissues. Keep that knife clean, as you can see under my easel. Here, I, in fact, have a toilet roll on. It works perfectly well for me. I can tear a piece off, wiped the knife clean. Andi, it is absolutely ideal. And there is nothing wrong with with a toilet roll. Finally, you will need to pieces of rag on a water container. In stage one, you're going to use the larger piece of rag and dip it in your water. Squeeze it out and then you're going to take some color off your palate and you're going to tend your canvas. That's to get rid of all the white, and then you're going to take a small piece on, wrap it around your finger, dip it into your pain, and you're going to actually outline your composition. You're not going to use pencils or brushes to do that. Well, that completes all the materials that you're going to need to do this painting on dive put a complete list of materials and paints in the pdf that accompanies this course 4. The 4 Stages: Hi, I'm Gerald and welcome to this hillside landscape. This painting will go through a simple four stage process. In Stage one. I'm going to take the canvas with light orange, then outlined the composition and then block in the dark areas on the mid tones. Working into the foreground, then on to Stage two, which is filling in the sky on will include some clouds in that as well, and then on to Stage three, which is establishing where the sunlight falls on this landscape because the sunlight, the direction of the sunlight, is coming from the right. So then we'll continue without mid tones, working forward, then onto stage for finally adding the highlights on the details. Here we go. 5. 01 Tint the Canvas: I'm going to start off by mixing a light orange with some cadmium yellow and have you tissue ready to keep your knife clean some titanium white on, then adding a touch of crimson into the mix. So move your knife left and right to give it a fairly good mix again. Wipe on the tissue because we're going to add a little bit more crimson. Now again, you don't need to. Over. Mix it. Taking your damp rag, dip it into the light orange and start to wipe it onto the canvas. Moving left and right. It doesn't really matter. You don't have to do this perfectly. This is just a matter of covering all that white campus because it's much easier to work on a tinted surface. Be much easier to establish all your light areas and your dark areas, and it gives a really good foundation to start building. You're painting 6. 02 Outline the Composition: The next step is to outline the composition. So we take some ultra marine blue life in the knife again. Add a touch of crimson Andi, some titanium white, and as you mix this color, you can see it produces a wonderful violet. You don't want to make it too dark at this stage. That will do so. Taking your dry rag on top of your fingertip, you can now dip it into your paint and on your canvas about 2/3 up to the right. Make a mark and then about 1/3 up from the left, another mark. And now you can establish the line of the hillside. A touch more paint Now, on the end of your fingertip so that we can 2/3 over to the right. You can start to establish the bushes on this hillside ridge again. You don't have to be too detailed at all. It's just a matter of establishing approximately where they're going to be on on the left here. Now we're going to indicate where the distant hill is sitting 7. 03 Red Tint: you're going to mix a deeper orange. Now you take some crimson and added to the light orange that you mixed. Before this is going to go in the foreground, white your knife on your damp rag on, dip it into the red orange mix and then take it over and wipe it into the foreground area. Take it up to the ridge line and then bring it down into the foreground. You can actually add some more crimson to it to deepen the color, especially down in the foreground. If you look at a color wheel, you'll notice that red and green are opposites, which means they're complementary colors, so allowing touches of the red to show through, especially in this foreground area, will add vibrancy to the overall color composition. 8. 04 Darks: now that the foreground has been tinted, we're going to work on the dark areas, taking some ultra marine blue and adding some crimson to make a really a fairly deep violet . And this will provide a good deep tone for the shadow area for the bushes on the hillside ridge. The great thing about using a painting knife is that you really don't need to over mix all your colors each time. Now, taking the dark tone here, you can see how I'm applying it with side of the knife and, really, at this early stage, were blocking in all the shadow areas. When you look into a new area of trees or bushes and you see the darkest part in the shadow area, that's what we're actually doing now, actually putting in that shadow area each area of the painting, this block in stage will look quite flat, so don't be too concerned about it. It's really important to establish. The general shapes were looking at the big shapes, as you can see in the foreground, how that warm red has the appearance of coming forward already compared to the sky area. By adding this dark shadow tone you can see already that it provides great contrast between the sky. Andi, the warm foreground that we have here. It's really important at the beginning of any landscape painting to really establish your darkest areas first, imagine if you were just to start on your sky. You don't have any contrast. You don't have any foundation or any key that will set up the painting. So in those early stage is really important to get those darks in. Now we're taking some ultra marine blue and adding some cadmium yellow on a touch of white , because we're now going to start working on some of the values and green values just underneath that line of Bush's again, a fairly deep tone, but not to green at this stage, because we're just putting down a general color again. This is This is really what we call an under painting, and the under painting provides a really good, solid foundation to enable you to really start working lighter killers and values. As you're painting develops, I'm adding a touch of crimson as you can see to the green Andi. That just reduces the strength and also gives a slightly deeper tone now the great thing. As you can see with the knife as you spread the color on, you don't have to over mix it because the killers do start to mix slightly as you spread them on the canvas. And it's good just to leave areas of streaks you don't really want to over mix it, and this is what gives the painting its character. When you're using a painting knife, I'm adding some titanium white to the green, a touch of crimson to first of all, lighten the color that I have here also with a touch of ultra marine blue. And as you can see, it's making more of a neutral color now, especially adding a touch more of the blue. This is going to go along the ridge on the hillside just to give a little bit more of an alternative neutral color and a bit more distance just in that particular area again. As you can see, you don't overmix it. You put it down and let some of that under painting already there show through. I'm now adding some cadmium yellow on a touch of ultra marine blue to bring back a deeper green, not a strong green, but a more of a muted green to continue in this mid ground area 9. 05 Foreground Darks: I'm now going to continue blocking in this foreground area as you can see our believing areas of orange showing through but now making a deeper purple here, having ultra marine blue and some crimson. As you can see, you don't need to over mix the color on your palate. Leave some of it partially unmixed because as you apply the color in, as you can see as you spread it out with the knife, that's all part of the quality and the character of the paint just skimming over the surface here with the knife, allowing some of that unmixed color to show through. As you can see, the crimson is showing there, and it really provides a great background under painting for what is going to go on top. And as I work forward, I'm going to deepen the color, adding a touch more ultra marine here to the mix and possibly a little bit more crimson into that. So coming deeper as well again, not over mixing but really producing some good rich darks For this foreground area. You can have a lot of fun using the knife, just allowing the character off the movement of the knife to come through the way the paint actually comes off on onto the canvas. As you can see here, I'm leaving some broken areas of that red showing through on a few scrape marks. Don't be afraid to just take the edge of the knife and scrape even some vertical and horizontal marks. It would all had character, and you can allow areas like that to show through as you develop that painting, just continually adding character to your work again. Not over mixing, producing some really good darks here now in the foreground. And I want to emphasize, particularly in this area here, a stronger dark just to add some riel contrast. So really have some fun doing this whole process. And don't don't keep continually working over it, and you can see here I'm allowing the knife just to scrape over the surface, and it creates its own marks and its own character. You can see now how we have some real depth developing with the darks in the foreground going into that middle distance and make sure that you stand well back and have a look at your painting. You'll be able to see the whole picture, Andi. It will give you a real sense off the depth that you're able to create even at this early stage. This is stage one now complete where we've tempted the canvas with outlined this simple composition were blocked in the Dark's. Andi established some of these mid values as well. So now we can move on to stage two, which is this guy. 10. 06 Sky: moving on to the sky area. Now you're going to mix two portions off blue, taking some white over to the left hand side on your palate. Add some ultra marine blue. This is going to be the lightest blue, and then you take some more white. Remember to wipe your knife takes in more white on underneath. Add a little bit more ultra marine blue and making this slightly deeper. Remember again. Don't overmix your colors on the palette because this is what gives the painting it's character, especially when you're painting with a knife. Now taking the lightest blue. As you can see, we start on the right hand side here and spread this light blue color fairly evenly. But don't worry if some of that light under painting shows through. Really, at this stage, it's a matter of getting the paint on the canvas. Now, working your way down to the horizon there, which is the top of the rich next to the bush, is on the right, and now you can start to also fill in around the darks off the bush There. Don't worry too much about obliterating as you paint around it because you're going to actually reestablish the shadow area of the bush, so don't worry too much about going over it and just continue painting in the area. They're always going to be times throughout the painting when you need to correct certain areas. So you have just put a so much they have lifted some of the original killer that dark color , so just paint over it on. Don't press too hard with the knife so that you keep lifting that color and just continue. And that will be fine now, adding a touch more blue to the mix to make it slightly deeper. And then we finish off with this mix on the left hand side, covering the remaining area, and you can see quite easily how you have the three tones there that quite distinct at the moment, the slightly deeper one here and then going towards the right to the middle, slightly lighter on on the right, slightly like to still and now just finishing off, taking the color down to the line where the top off the distant hill is going to appear now , taking some white into that mix, going to be slightly lighter on the touch of the blue. We're going to indicate some clouds here on the right again, not pressing too hard with the knife, but just letting the paint fall off the knife, taking it over to the right there and giving the impression of some lighter clouds. 11. 07 Clouds: into the light mix that we used for the clouds. I added a touch of cadmium yellow and a touch of crimson, and now going to apply that over the light mix that we had before. As you can see, you've got to be really fairly light with the application so that you don't really disturb the color underneath. Now, taking some more white into the mix a little bit of blue on a really small amount of crimson there. And as you can see, it's going slightly pinkish. Now on this will lay this on top of that yellowish color underneath. I think it took more white now to make it lighter still on because we're in the final stage of completing the sky area. Putting this final highlight really makes the clouds just pop. Andi. Allowing the knife just to drag over the color underneath really completes the formation of the clouds. A few final touches now with the paint almost white. Just to add that final highlight. A few sweeps left and right again try not to disturb the color underneath 12. 08 Distant Hill: moving on now to the distant hill, adding a touch more blue to deep in the color and using the edge of the knife. This is this is the great thing about using the painting knife. It's really easy to define the top edge of that hillside, but what you don't want to do is to make a perfectly straight line. So just by pressing the knife, it's easy, as you can see, just to change the shape of it on and let some of that sky tone just show through here and there. And by keeping the edge quite soft, allowing some of that sky tone to show through, you see how it just breaks the line on. It just softens the edge and also helps to create a really sense off depth. As you can see now, the foreground is really strong, right through to the middle distance to that far hill, giving a great sense off aerial perspective. I'm adding a touch more blue to the mix just to strengthen the shadow area on the left hand side, off the hill here, just to it's a tone darker and just giving a little bit more shape on a little bit more character, too, to that side again, not pushing the knife in, but just allowing it to touch and skim really over the surface and using the top edge of the knife. You can see just to break that line again. I'm adding a touch more blue to that mix on Detective Crimson. To make it slightly deeper, I've decided just to strengthen the top left hand area of the sky, almost putting in some cloud, which is slightly deeper in tone, giving it a bit more character, going from the left over the centre and to the right and again skimming just over the surface of what is there already, without disturbing what's underneath on by making it slightly deeper in tone on the left hand side. Here, working over lighter on the right, it just adds a little bit more contrast, a little bit more drama to the shapes of those clouds there, and it really also enhances the lightest area of the clouds by having just a few dark streaks here and there 13. 09 Re establish Bush Darks: I'm now going to reestablish the shadow area in the bushes on the top of the hillside ridge . So mixing a deeper violet with some ultra marine, blue and crimson Andi just redefining the overall shape off these bushes here again, don't be too concerned about the actual shape because we're going to work mid tones over the top of this. It's just really to enhance the shadow of the darkest darks. As we call it into this area. If a touch of the dark overlaps, just smudge it with your finger on, blend it in. We've now completed this stage where the sky is now in with some clouds on Also, we've got this distant hill. Now the important thing to remember is that once you've got the sky complete, which is the most distant part of the picture, you start working. Gradually forward until we're right down in the foreground. Now we're gonna move on to stage three on introducing the sunlight where it falls on this hillside 14. 10 Hill Lights: moving on now to establish where the sunlight falls on top of the hill side along the ridge . So taking some white touch of ultra marine blue and adding some cadmium now to mix a fairly pale green. You don't want it to strong at this stage because this is this is going to be the middle distance color and keep it fairly light. Don't have too much blue at this stage. Otherwise it will go to dark. The factor about killer mixing is you have to continually judge is a color to light too dark or too pale or too strong, and so you are continually adjusting the killer as well, providing that you don't overmix it each time. So now, starting along the hillside ridge, you lay collect in. Just drag it to the left and to the right, and you can see how moving the knife when you're not pressing. How it leaves areas off the under painting, which continually really adds more character to the painting. And that's the great thing about the knife, letting the life do the work, not pushing the paint too much into the canvas. Start laying down broad strokes, which will give you really clean areas of color. And this is one of the beauties of using a painting knife that without over mixing on the palate, the killer has more of a vibrancy, and it looks fresher as well as you're laying in this lighter tone. In nice, broad strokes, you can see the dynamics of the contrast of this really quite strong color against the foreground dark or the middle distance darks. I've added a touch of cadmium and now touch of ultra marine blue, too. Strengthen the green and make a slightly darker on also make it slightly stronger by adding certainly more yellow and adding a touch of crimson just to warm it slightly. And so now, as I mixed this, we bring this down into this, this middle area. It's sort of halfway with broad clean strokes of color, not mixed with the under painting, keeping it fresh 15. 11 Foreground Lights: continuing on now further down into the foreground, making a stronger green mawr cadmium yellow, a touch off ultra marine blue, giving us a really nice green mawr, going more now to an olive green and adding a touch of white, keeping it fairly light. Not too dark at this stage, the gain Just laying the knife. They're not pressing too hard on letting the color fall off the knife, allowing that also bearing in mind, allowing the under painting to show through here and there. You don't want to obliterate all those darks, and you could also see the texture of the paint from the knife, adding took more white Andi warming this green now by having touch of crimson to bring some more warmth into the foreground. And you see again how broadly and putting that on with the knife. Andi. You can also use the tip of your finger just to smooch the edges here and there. It really adds a variety off texture, certainly to the edges of the paint, where you got the contrast of the strong color against those darks and adding a real sense of depth to the picture. Having accepted more crimson now to this green mix and cadmium yellow, making it stronger and also warmer, bringing it right down into the foreground museum, overlapping some of the color here on the tip of the knife. Here, I'm adding some crimson to this neutral tone on going to use this as a little bit of a contrast. A cool contrast along the top edge of that ridge here, and what this does is just Brexit that area and so dragging it over the lighter green you can see it really helps to break up just some of that distant area again. It's having more character, adds texture and also complements the light green now running the knife just through that to soften the edge and just take a little bit of the strength out of it. Also running some of that tone along the top of the ridge there, on smoothing it out left and right 16. 12 Hillside Bushes: I'm mixing some olive greens now for the bushes on that hillside ridge. They're taking cadmium yellow, ultra marine blue on a touch of white there and now starting to apply it from the right on , now going to add a touch more crimson to the mix to warm it up slightly. And the idea is not to try and paint individual clumps of leaves, but to just paint broad areas of color, obviously not obliterating the darks that you have underneath, but just allowing the color to fall off the knife. The thing to bear in mind is that this is an Impressionist style landscape. It's not meant to have any detail at all. You don't you don't paint individual leaves or branches or twigs. It really is to give an impression. So nice, large areas of color on because you're painting broadly with the knife. It's really important to keep standing back from time to time to look at your picture, because when you're working so closely, you don't have a good idea of what it looked like as a whole. I'm mixing a darker tone now with blue and crimson to re establish some of the shadow area in these bushes and also a little bit further up to break the areas of foliage. Andi. Time to take another step back to reassess the whole picture, to see how it's looking on, just completing with a few more dark streaks before we go on to the final stage, highlighting and some detail. 17. 13 Middle Distance Highlights: Now we're on to the final. Highlights on I have added a touch of white and can't be into this blue to mix a really light but cooler color, which, as you can see, I'm now placing on the far distance on the rich of this hillside. The's highlights concert only add a little bit of contrast that you can see, but also at the same time can suggest maybe pieces of dead wood fencing, stones, rocks or any general debris that may be lying around the ground area and now with the edge of the knife. As you can see, I'm just laying in some odd branches here and there. You don't overdo it again. It's just to give that impression that you can see them through the foliage, sitting against the dark areas, the shadow areas and to add a bit of variety, picking up a touch of that cooler light blue again with the edge of the knife, but at the same time remembering not to overdo it, I'm adding a touch of crimson to that mix. Two. To warm it up even further still, so you have a little bit more contrast with this warmer tone Andi. This adds a little bit more of a spark as it breaks through the foliage, finishing off there with a few more dabs. And now we're complete having a touch more white now to this mix. Andi, tiny spot of cadmium to really warm. This do really warm this highlight color, which I'm now going to place against the darks. They're just dragged the knife out to the right, and it gives a real strong highlight, a really warm, strong highlight against those darks having a tip more white to make it even lighter still , to actually lay over the color that I just put on as you can see. Now they're putting the sauna, letting it drag over the top of that previous warm color. With a little bit of the white, you can see a little portion of the white just showing through there and dragging it out. And now, adding just a touch of crimson to warm this color up as I spread it into the middle area. As you can see, spread it broadly left and right. Don't overmix it, but just let it fall over the top of the color that's underneath and just softening a few of the edges to complete the highlights in this middle area. 18. 14 Final Highlights: I have decided to had a few more highlights, as you can see, dabs here and there again, not over doing it, but these these concert jest rocks and these highlights also stand out against the dark areas. But again, you've got to be careful that you don't go and overdo it, but just sufficient just to break up there. And, as you can see, bringing some down into that middle distance, especially strong highlights, really worked nicely against deeper tones. Deeper colors now coming down right into the foreground, the warm highlights there you condemn them here and there. But again, don't overdo them. You see how it just breaks and adds a little bit of interest with those highlights, especially in the foreground area, now adding a touch of crimson to this blue on going to now at this over some of the deeper shadow area right down in the foreground. And as you can see, this cool grey blue adds, a nice contrast to the shadow area on suggests different textures on the surface, but it really adds a good complement on because it breaks up the ground area. It just adds a little bit more interest and now taking some white into this mixture for one final highlight, which I'm going to place right down in the foreground here. And the important thing is not to go over it twice. Put it on, let it come off the knife and I've just broken a couple of the edges there. But it's really important to leave that highlight right in the center, so it looks really fresh and spontaneous. And one final touch. Ensure that you sign your name because it signifies that your painting is now complete. 19. Summary: well, that just about wraps it up for this course. I really hope that you have enjoyed watching the step by step videos on Learn Something about killer mixing, using three primary colors on Dwight and how to use the painting knife. Obviously, there is a huge range of different colors available to you reds, yellows and blues on. The reason I've chosen these three particular colors is that ultra marine, blue and crimson make the best violence, and I love using that killer for the darks and the shadow areas, especially cadmium. Yellow makes a wonderful olive greens, and we have a lot of that variety of color in the Australian landscape. I have included a step by step pdf guide as an accompaniment to all the videos, including a photo reference of the painting for you to follow. I really hope that you enjoy having a good doing this landscape with your three primary colors and painting knife on. I really look forward to seeing the results of what you've done. I would also really appreciate your comments about this course, and finally, as my mental once told me, just paint