ARTICLES

In our first monthly module, we explored the work of Edgar Payne and his techniques for creating beautiful and artistic trees by studying his painting "Eucalyptus Trees". It's a stunning painting, and what I realized as I was doing the master copy was not only how beautiful the trees were, but...

by Jed Dorsey

This interview is from a recent live Q&A that we did for Acrylic University members in our private Facebook Community. We decided to share it here so that others can listen in on this guest interview with artist extraordinaire, Aimee Erickson. The first 30 minutes of...

by Jed Dorsey

This video is from a recent live Q&A that we did for Acrylic University members in our private Facebook Community. We decided to share it here so that others can listen in on this guest interview with California landscape painter, Rick Delanty. The first half of the video is the...

It can be so overwhelming to know what colors to purchase. There are so many. You can use a very limited palette using one of each of the primaries (plus black and white). But you may want to add to that palette instead of mixing all your colors. Sometimes it's easier when colors have been...

Someone asked me recently, "What does it mean to express yourself through art and how do we figure out what we want to express?"

If you’ve ever taken a “Sip and Paint” class, you have seen how each person in the class creates a different painting even though everyone starts...

There's a lot of discussion out there about Oils vs Acrylics. Oils have been used for 600 years or more making Acrylic paints seem like a baby by comparison. Acrylic artists are vastly outnumbered by oil artists. Just head to any painting event and take a look around - we're outnumbered 10...

One of our Acrylic University members asked, "What kind of light bulb do you use in your studio? I've noticed that the lighting in my paint area is not correct and I have been reading about lumens and light appearance. Do you take these into consideration?"

If the light on my canvas is too...

There's a couple of different ways you can use the paintbox. Dianna Shyne, a great acrylic artist, actually just scoops out piles into her palette from the paintbox with a palette knife. She's not really dipping her brush into her paintbox. So you could scoop paint out with a palette knife and...

Reference photos are a seriously underrated aspect of painting. I often get asked the questions "What makes a good reference photo?"

Whenever I get asked this question by students I always answer, "It comes down to design." 

When I'm looking at a photograph there are a few design...