Painting Tips to Help You Decide Which Paint to Us

Painting Tips to Help You Decide Which ,you tube oil paintingPaint to Use
How to choose between oils, acrylics, watercolours and pastels One of the very first decisions you must make when you start painting is what sort of paint (also called medium) to use The following information is intended to be informative and help you decide between the most commonly used paints
How to choose between oils, acrylics, watercolours and pastels
One of the very first decisions you must make when you start painting is what sort of paint (also called medium) to use. The following information is intended to be informative and help you decide between the most commonly used paints.
What is paint and what is the difference between each type of paint?
The brief technical bit!
Paint is a dispersion of pigments, resins and fillers in a liquid carrier. By varying the basic ingredients the different types of paint can be created.
Oil Paints
Oil paints as the name suggests contain oil. This is usually a natural vegetable oil such as linseed or a synthetic hydrocarbon made from oil.
The oil is the carrier used for the pigment and resins (alkyd). The pigments provide the colour which can be in the form of a soluble dye or an insoluble powder finely dispersed in the liquid. The various colours are produced from one or several pigments mixed together. By varying the different amounts, not only the different colours, but different shades and hues can be produced.
The resin is dissolved in the oil and acts as a binder for the different ingredients and to, and also binds the paint to the surface that it is applied to.
When the liquid evaporates after application, the resin and the pigments remain and form a skin which sticks to the painting surface.
Acrylic Paints
Acrylic paints are similar in make-up to oil paints, i.e. they are similar in appearance and contain a liquid carrier, pigments and resin. However, the liquid used is water.
The resin is not the same type as in oil paints, because it has to combine with water. The acrylic resin does not dissolve in the water but forms an emulsion (forms globules). When the water evaporates the globules of resin stick together to form a skin. The pigments used must also combine with water and so are chemically different than oil pigments.
Watercolours
Watercolours consist of pigments, filler and water if they are in liquid form, or just pigment and filler in they are solid. As they have no resin component to bind the pigments and form a skin, they rely on the surface they are applied to, to be absorbent. A filler is a fine powder which can be used as a carrier for the pigment and provides texture/body.
Pastels
Pastels are a solid paste form of water-colour. Far less water is used in their manufacture (when compared with liquid paints), and water soluble binders are used to maintain their solid paste form. Oil based pastels are similar with far less oil used than used in making oil paints.
What are the practical differences between the different types of paints?
Oils:
dry slowly allowing time to work and to blend colours. The temperature of the air you are working in, and the proportion of thinner used dictates the drying time
can be used to produce texture by building layers
once dried sufficiently, can be over-painted without disturbing underlying layers
rich, deep colours which maintain their intensity when dry, so can be left unfinished and returned to later without a change of colour
can be used thickly or in thin, smooth washes increasing the scope for different painting techniques
colours are resistant to bleaching by sunlight and surfaces can be cleaned of dirt with methylated spirits
completely water proof and resistant to the elements
require brush cleaner/white spirits to clean brushes
usually applied to non absorbent surfaces including board, wood, coated paper and canvas