I started with oils at about 11. During my 20's I switched to acrylics but was never happy dealing with drying times. About 4 years ago I thought I'd try my hand at watercolours (which I had previously felt a bit snooty about - that watercolours were easier, childish, for Sunday painters, not the "real thing"). I've spent 4 years getting thoroughly schooled! Watercolours are NOT easier than oils. If you can paint with oils, it doesn't mean that watercolours will be easy to master or vice versa! The techniques are totally different in every way. After 4 years study I'm totally hooked on the luminosity of watercolour and the amazing lighting effects that can be achieved. Yes! Lighting effects in watercolour! But it's not easy because it's the difference between pottery and stonemasonry. Watercolour is all about negative shapes and leaving behind the form, like stone sculpture. The difference in cost is huge. Water colours are very much cheaper. Paper is very much cheaper than canvas. Medium - water, much cheaper than oil mediums. Clean up cheaper. Framing cheaper. I'm doing some oils at the moment, but they're not "harder" to do than the watercolours. But they take a totally different approach.
@@anjastracey-pijnappels7332 I think it was meant as a comparison - all art materials at the highest levels are expensive, but oil paints more so than any other painting medium.
All these mediums are just a matter of technique, but if you go for the light effects, good composition and central focal point, your painting will be spectacular - the medium just becomes a matter of personal choice.
Stefan, we all know you like oils. Watercolor, pastels, acrylics, color pencils, and more are just a means to achieve a creative effect. Now, I have viewed all of your videos, (not a small task) and what you teach applies to any and all materials that form the creative image. I have used your teachings with my photography and it has helped. I have always have use some of what you teach, but lighting effects has giving me a whole new approach. Great information, Stefan.
Stefan, your tutorials are awesome. I'm so glad I chanced upon them because no one else whose tutorials I've found on line speaks from such a deeply ingrained and inspired understanding of art, which can only come from living your art instead of just "doing" your art. To me a truly "inspired" artist, (be they a musician, poet, painter, etc.), lives their art, rather than just perform their art. This, my friend. is obviously what you are. Thank you so much for sharing your insight with us.
Watercolor is harder. You can't even start a realistic style painting without planning out your lights and whites, and sticking to it. With oil you can just keep slapping on the paint to keep correcting, since everything can be covered. Oil is a whole lot more forgiving and thus much easier. Watercolor takes much more planning and discipline as it is much more restricted. Watercolors also have a mind of their own, and this changes based on what each brand uses in their paints. I'd actually start in watercolor to learn respect for the paint and self control, then do oils. Oils are simply submissive. Starting in watercolor is also much cheaper as no pigment is wasted on the palette, just add water to reactivate and a little goes a very long way. I think because of the planning required you'll learn to be clean, precise and deliberate with brush strokes as well as less wasteful of time and supplies. I love realistic paintings and I can achieve this beautifully in watercolor, but it won't have that depth and shine like oils. They are like the opposite ends of painting. Oils are best with the oil painting look and watercolor is best with the watercolor look. I'm learning both and respect what each are best at and their limits. I also love pastels, colored and watercolor pencils, inks, acrylics with brush and airbrush.... the list goes on and they each have different looks, qualities, and behaviour that require different set of skills and abilities. All VERY AWESOME. :) I also enjoy practicing different penmanship styles which is not painting but certainly an artform that demands practice and skill.
Very interesting perspective. Love the reinforcement about choosing the central focal point, how to manipulate the light to create the focal point. Not only does light naturally change every 7 minutes, but it truly never STOPS changing! If I can commit the scene to memory while painting, man oh man that would be sweet. Loved the comment "you can't tell God... well I can. I moonlight giving Bible studies" I was rolling on the floor!! Love your sense of humor bro, you're the best! Dont' stop coaching, that is your true gift. Peace and joy to you Stefan
Whether it's the hardest medium or not, I think that depends on the artist itself if you enjoy using that medium or not and how much you practice using that medium.
Stefan, I avoided oils for DECADES. Now I'm finding that some of the skills and ways of seeing things are transferring over into my watercolors. Thanks for a great video.
You are a wonderful teacher, I have been following you for some time and I am grateful for those valuable lessons and assure you that I benefited from you more than all my experiences in life and envy your students for being with you. I wish I could be among them.You are the MASTER, Greetings from Lebanon 🇱🇧 😍
With all due respect, watercolour IS the most difficult medium to master. We've even been taught way, way back 30+ years ago in fine art school: once you've mastered watercolour, any other medium will be easy. With watercolour, you have VERY little room for error, you have to be precise on the first try - and you have very little time to do it (only a few minutes). In the most purist version where you don't get to use gouache white, you also have the limitation of keeping your whites white by laying colours strategically from the get-go and not letting them run over the lighter areas, while at the same time trying to let the colours mix and run freely in the larger tonal areas to bring out the absolute best and unique feature of watercolour, which is the fluid flow of colours and fading into one another. Add to this the requirement for the paper to "breathe" even through the darkest of the darks with the watercolour, plus the delicate nature of paper (can't rub it too intensely to avoid surface damage), and you have the single most difficult medium to contend with. While pastels are definitely easier than watercolours, they still have their tricky moments. The difficulty with pastels is matching the few hundred of the pre-manufactured hues and values to the 16 million or more of the colours a regular human eye can see, and while it sounds simplistic, in practice, it is a lot harder to accomplish if you strive for realism and want to avoid making your painting look like one of those children's colouring books. I am just starting to work in oils, and while they absolutely drive me up the wall with their drying times and inability to fully rinse the brushes clean after each stroke, I do find that it is immensely easier to correct mistakes in oil. Plus, sky is the limit as far as layering of the glazes in oil, while with watercolour and pastel layering is limited by the risk of dissolving the underlying colours and muddying them up and by the amount of pigment the tooth of the pastel support can hold, plus the muddying of colour and changing the optical characteristics (that "sparkly vividness" only possible in soft pastel) of the pigment particles by overblending. On top of this, in either watercolour or pastel you have no option to spruce up the more "boring" parts of your painting by enhancing your surface with the bas-relief of any kind of impasto technique, so, you have to make do without relying on very many gimmicks like this. And last but not least, with both watercolour and pastel, you are limited in the types of surfaces suitable for these media and are stuck with their respective limitations, while oil can stick to a much, much wider range of surfaces. Oil has none of these limiting parameters to contend with, therefore, I find it it is much easier and simpler to work with than either watercolour or pastel. I actually feel like I am cheating when I work in oil because here, you can: 1. correct just about any mistake save for ripping the canvas; 2. Work for as long as you want, even years; 3. Layer on an infinite amount of colour, glazes, and painting medium without damaging the underlying layers or support; 4. Not worry about crushing your pigment (or at least, less so than with pastel); 5. Use 3D enhancements to your surfaces or add layers which bring in different refractive properties to existing colours, as is the case with some types of impasto media. The only difficulties with oil are its maddening drying time and the fact that there are so many additional options to master. Oh, plus having to know all the chemistry and safety aspects of all its thinners, solvents, mediums, and varnishes.
Luthien Tinuviel There are new synthetic drawing “papers” like Yupo that enable the watercolor artist to scrub away without tearing and recover the white.
I never thought watercolor was harder, matter of fact, my idea of watercolor, being the first medium I have ever used to make a painting, I thought it was just like anything else. The paint is just different in the way you have to apply it, but you can achieve the same results as with acrylic, or oils. I think you confuse painting with water colors as a stylistic fluid look, rather than using them as opaque paint. Its all in what you desire to achieve, and how you want your work to look. If you want to get huge spreads of color over a vast sheet of paper, then yes, it gets complicated and very "iffy" as to what happens. You could call that hard, or you could say that was fun to see the surprises that occurred.
Water color is easy to start with, you don't have to have to much equipment and space, they are easy to clean and they are much chiper to start. Problem is water color is more unforgiving than oil. To me in oil you have more artistic freedom, but problem is they are more expensive to start, you need more space, more equipment, they are harder to clean, they are smelly and this can be problem if you don't own your own house. Stefan says go darker if you mess up, but then your painting will be under exposed just like photo will be if you mess up exposure. From perspective of most people water color are easiest for beginners, but harder to master because of unforgiveness and unpredictability. Still they are some rare artist who are so good in water color that theirs paintings look like real photographs.
I want to see them all! I was fortunate to get to see a rare exhibition of the masters’ drawings (Durer, Fragonard, Rubens, etc) while I was in Frankfurt, Germany. I found them more lively and passionate than the finished oil paintings. Any more, there’s new papers, mediums, and materials that enable new adventures in art-regardless of the media.
I have a heck of a time with watercolor. I have been a lifelong acrylic artist. I can make my acrylics look like watercolor, and they stay where they are. So, for me, watercolor is difficult because it can be re-hydrated and moves around too much. I have done a few oils, and I find I can do okay, I just need to remember the drying time is longer than with acrylic.
Practice replaces all the theory about the difficulty level of a medium. I find the transition from one medium to another the most difficult ... but it is transitory. I LOVE oils but have found that it is best (for me) used in my studio. Acrylics do well for me when I am painting outside as transporting an almost dry painting is easier but I always have a wee watercolour set in my purse for those "in-between" times. Let's face it, any medium has its learning curve and the thing I like best is that I have a choice. I also love the challenge.
Most of the shows I have put my work into thought the medium was oil, not because I was trying to make acrylics look like oils, but because I make acrylics look like reality and paint realistically. I have dominantly used acrylics in my art forever. (35-40 years) Not because I thought it was harder, or better, but because it is what I could afford. Now that I work oils, I still work my underpainting with acrylics, and I think that because I have learned the technique for acrylic as a non forgiving medium, oils are easy. Everything in my experience tells me that your idea of oils and acrylics is backwards from what I see happening with the two mediums... I goto museums to see great art. Most museums have more oils paintings simple because there were not any alternatives throughout history, we have only just gotten acrylics, so the Robert Bateman's of the world haven't filtered their way into history just yet. But you might also think about the stereotypical thinking of galleries and museum curators about oils vs acrylic. What do they think they can get more for? They have more to say about a traditional medium which they can promote from the perspective of history.
Love the analogy where you illustrate the artistic license as the "space between the notes", that's where the interpretation comes from. How do you see the red ball? Where is the lighting coming from, how red? How shall I paint it? How large, where in the composition is it placed? What is the central focal point? How do I want to light it? Etc. Very thought provoking. "Don't sleep with him the first night, go home and think about it" Truer words were never spoken lol. BTW, we lost a beautiful artist, Richard Schmid, on April 18, 2021 :-(. Paint on my friend
Hi Stefan, love lisening and watching your painting content its been so insightful on my painting journey! I would love to know what the ajustable light your are using is called so i could try to get one for myself to use. Keep up to good work!
Hi Stefan, I wonder what you think of watermixable oils. I began to paint with them years ago because I painted at home. I still do but there's no-one to have objections. I use paste to keep the paint 'buttery'.
I agree. I’ve painted with watercolours for several years, (not proper art, just cutesy animals) I’m trying to learn oil painting, and to me it is like painting with butter. With watercolours the colours mix on the paper themselves but with oils I have to plan the colours and the spontaneity goes out the window. Oil painting is definitely the hardest medium.
well it depends on what you are using the watercolors for. if you are doing competitions in watercolor there is a whole other world. if you do illustrations or drawings in pencil or ink and you just want to colorize them you can use basic watercolor washes very qickly and effectively
I think every medium has its own appeal, if I’m painting watercolour I don’t want it to look like oils and vice versa, I don’t think any mediums are “hard” I think it’s all down to what you enjoy using most, I find a lot of the myths about the restrictions of watercolours are from people who have never painted with or haven’t learned how to use them. 🙂
I stick with watercolour and gouache for now because its affordable for me and i don't have the studio space to paint oil, the last oil painting I did received a lot of complaints on the turpentine smell and paint smell and for taking up space :( i love oil painting though~
I used to do oils all the time but my husband couldn't take the odour. I switched to acrylic and watercolor. Everyone tells me to do washes, I often wondered but never knew. Thank you.
Do you happen to have a demo in watercolor or acrylics. I am painting a rose and I would like to know more about putting dark color first then the next steps.?
Dazzelated Watercolours are hard to do well ! He is wrong. You can do simple watercolours, but to do well, especially the darks, you will lose the luminosity, if you are not careful. I’ve done all of them, watercolours are by far the most difficult.
@@teodygaspar He seems primarily paint with oil so he might not. It has been a while since I commented but there are several techniques (ways) to paint with watercolors so some of them are easier...I would say.
Thank you so much:) You inspired me to put together a web site and contact a gallery - haven't heard back from them so I will take that as a no:) Well, there is always Etsy.
@dannimac Thank you - that is good advice. There are not many galleries in my area, and I may try another. I walk through them and see some really excellent paintings and think I am too much a beginner - then see others and think mine aren't so bad:)
I buy house paint samples and use it on 90lb mixed media paper. You can do lots of experimentation, be very bold and it is incredibly cheap. You can also get a jar of mistinted samples for .50 or a dollar at Lowe's, or a whole gallon for $9 Sometimes you can find some great colors. The you can finish the work with nice acrylics or oil paint.
Watercolors are not easier than oils....LOL I love your videos but this made me laugh. There are many reasons you see a lot of watercolors at shows. One is that they dry fast and can be sold instantly. They are smaller to store, easier and cheaper to frame, easier to scan and make prints from. Many people enjoy the loose effects you get from working wet on wet. They are cheaper to approach from a beginners standpoint. The painting itself is not easier.
@@MrKongatthegates Sargent is an oil painter but very good in watercolor even Sorolla too. Even a self taught Chamberlain he do oil and watercolor. Oil can be erase watercolor cannot...so hard.
Lol so many upset watercolour painters. Have done all. Oil is by far the hardest. Sure maybe you could turn so,etching mediocre put with a bit of practise, but to do something great is very difficult. Also, watercolours create a lot of effects that oils and acrylics don’t get. I feel it’s easier to hide behind these effects whereas with oil and acrylic, you must create your own style and unique strokes. Probably unpopular opinion but he’s right…. I don’t go anywhere to look at watercolours.
one thing about watercolor is that you can only do it on paper, so that diminishes the worth. they are great for studies and students but work on paper is not as permanent and not as valuable
One of those women really wanted her opinions to be heard above all others. Oh no all frames are Mitered. Oh no water color is by far the hardest. I would pull my hair out. At one point I was waiting for... "listen you old bat" lol
I started with oils at about 11. During my 20's I switched to acrylics but was never happy dealing with drying times. About 4 years ago I thought I'd try my hand at watercolours (which I had previously felt a bit snooty about - that watercolours were easier, childish, for Sunday painters, not the "real thing"). I've spent 4 years getting thoroughly schooled! Watercolours are NOT easier than oils. If you can paint with oils, it doesn't mean that watercolours will be easy to master or vice versa! The techniques are totally different in every way. After 4 years study I'm totally hooked on the luminosity of watercolour and the amazing lighting effects that can be achieved. Yes! Lighting effects in watercolour! But it's not easy because it's the difference between pottery and stonemasonry. Watercolour is all about negative shapes and leaving behind the form, like stone sculpture.
The difference in cost is huge. Water colours are very much cheaper. Paper is very much cheaper than canvas. Medium - water, much cheaper than oil mediums. Clean up cheaper. Framing cheaper.
I'm doing some oils at the moment, but they're not "harder" to do than the watercolours. But they take a totally different approach.
watercolor is very cheap so everyone should try it.
Top quality watercolours are not cheap at all.
@@anjastracey-pijnappels7332 I think it was meant as a comparison - all art materials at the highest levels are expensive, but oil paints more so than any other painting medium.
All these mediums are just a matter of technique, but if you go for the light effects, good composition and central focal point, your painting will be spectacular - the medium just becomes a matter of personal choice.
Thank you for confirmation to go in dark with watercolor; I needed to hear that!
Stefan, we all know you like oils. Watercolor, pastels, acrylics, color pencils, and more are just a means to achieve a creative effect. Now, I have viewed all of your videos, (not a small task) and what you teach applies to any and all materials that form the creative image. I have used your teachings with my photography and it has helped. I have always have use some of what you teach, but lighting effects has giving me a whole new approach. Great information, Stefan.
Thanks Stefan for all the information that you give.
I love your sense of humor ~~ "you have to blow it to know it" Love it!!!
Stefan, your tutorials are awesome. I'm so glad I chanced upon them because no one else whose tutorials I've found on line speaks from such a deeply ingrained and inspired understanding of art, which can only come from living your art instead of just "doing" your art. To me a truly "inspired" artist, (be they a musician, poet, painter, etc.), lives their art, rather than just perform their art. This, my friend. is obviously what you are. Thank you so much for sharing your insight with us.
Thanks for the kind workds maybe someday we can talk about art in person
Watercolor is harder. You can't even start a realistic style painting without planning out your lights and whites, and sticking to it. With oil you can just keep slapping on the paint to keep correcting, since everything can be covered. Oil is a whole lot more forgiving and thus much easier. Watercolor takes much more planning and discipline as it is much more restricted. Watercolors also have a mind of their own, and this changes based on what each brand uses in their paints. I'd actually start in watercolor to learn respect for the paint and self control, then do oils. Oils are simply submissive. Starting in watercolor is also much cheaper as no pigment is wasted on the palette, just add water to reactivate and a little goes a very long way. I think because of the planning required you'll learn to be clean, precise and deliberate with brush strokes as well as less wasteful of time and supplies.
I love realistic paintings and I can achieve this beautifully in watercolor, but it won't have that depth and shine like oils. They are like the opposite ends of painting. Oils are best with the oil painting look and watercolor is best with the watercolor look. I'm learning both and respect what each are best at and their limits. I also love pastels, colored and watercolor pencils, inks, acrylics with brush and airbrush.... the list goes on and they each have different looks, qualities, and behaviour that require different set of skills and abilities. All VERY AWESOME. :) I also enjoy practicing different penmanship styles which is not painting but certainly an artform that demands practice and skill.
Zarah McIntosh you are right.
@@maxineboxer9714 she is.
@@donnaryan71 I think we need to keep in mind that the experience can vary from person to person.
watercolor is harder to bring to ralism, but thats not what its strengths are. its great for mdesigning or quick studies, not finished pieces
That's so true! I don't think Stefan really understands what he said about watercolours. With all the respect he is downright wrong on that.
Love you, love your insights on composition, arts comparison…and all 🌹
Very interesting perspective. Love the reinforcement about choosing the central focal point, how to manipulate the light to create the focal point. Not only does light naturally change every 7 minutes, but it truly never STOPS changing! If I can commit the scene to memory while painting, man oh man that would be sweet. Loved the comment "you can't tell God... well I can. I moonlight giving Bible studies" I was rolling on the floor!! Love your sense of humor bro, you're the best! Dont' stop coaching, that is your true gift. Peace and joy to you Stefan
Whether it's the hardest medium or not, I think that depends on the artist itself if you enjoy using that medium or not and how much you practice using that medium.
Watercolour's are exciting if done right, more exciting than oil in my opinion because they don't have that 'laboured' look.
Stefan, I avoided oils for DECADES. Now I'm finding that some of the skills and ways of seeing things are transferring over into my watercolors. Thanks for a great video.
You are a wonderful teacher, I have been following you for some time and I am grateful for those valuable lessons and assure you that I benefited from you more than all my experiences in life and envy your students for being with you. I wish I could be among them.You are the MASTER, Greetings from Lebanon 🇱🇧 😍
With all due respect, watercolour IS the most difficult medium to master. We've even been taught way, way back 30+ years ago in fine art school: once you've mastered watercolour, any other medium will be easy. With watercolour, you have VERY little room for error, you have to be precise on the first try - and you have very little time to do it (only a few minutes). In the most purist version where you don't get to use gouache white, you also have the limitation of keeping your whites white by laying colours strategically from the get-go and not letting them run over the lighter areas, while at the same time trying to let the colours mix and run freely in the larger tonal areas to bring out the absolute best and unique feature of watercolour, which is the fluid flow of colours and fading into one another. Add to this the requirement for the paper to "breathe" even through the darkest of the darks with the watercolour, plus the delicate nature of paper (can't rub it too intensely to avoid surface damage), and you have the single most difficult medium to contend with.
While pastels are definitely easier than watercolours, they still have their tricky moments. The difficulty with pastels is matching the few hundred of the pre-manufactured hues and values to the 16 million or more of the colours a regular human eye can see, and while it sounds simplistic, in practice, it is a lot harder to accomplish if you strive for realism and want to avoid making your painting look like one of those children's colouring books.
I am just starting to work in oils, and while they absolutely drive me up the wall with their drying times and inability to fully rinse the brushes clean after each stroke, I do find that it is immensely easier to correct mistakes in oil. Plus, sky is the limit as far as layering of the glazes in oil, while with watercolour and pastel layering is limited by the risk of dissolving the underlying colours and muddying them up and by the amount of pigment the tooth of the pastel support can hold, plus the muddying of colour and changing the optical characteristics (that "sparkly vividness" only possible in soft pastel) of the pigment particles by overblending. On top of this, in either watercolour or pastel you have no option to spruce up the more "boring" parts of your painting by enhancing your surface with the bas-relief of any kind of impasto technique, so, you have to make do without relying on very many gimmicks like this.
And last but not least, with both watercolour and pastel, you are limited in the types of surfaces suitable for these media and are stuck with their respective limitations, while oil can stick to a much, much wider range of surfaces.
Oil has none of these limiting parameters to contend with, therefore, I find it it is much easier and simpler to work with than either watercolour or pastel. I actually feel like I am cheating when I work in oil because here, you can: 1. correct just about any mistake save for ripping the canvas; 2. Work for as long as you want, even years; 3. Layer on an infinite amount of colour, glazes, and painting medium without damaging the underlying layers or support; 4. Not worry about crushing your pigment (or at least, less so than with pastel); 5. Use 3D enhancements to your surfaces or add layers which bring in different refractive properties to existing colours, as is the case with some types of impasto media.
The only difficulties with oil are its maddening drying time and the fact that there are so many additional options to master. Oh, plus having to know all the chemistry and safety aspects of all its thinners, solvents, mediums, and varnishes.
Luthien Tinuviel There are new synthetic drawing “papers” like Yupo that enable the watercolor artist to scrub away without tearing and recover the white.
I never thought watercolor was harder, matter of fact, my idea of watercolor, being the first medium I have ever used to make a painting, I thought it was just like anything else. The paint is just different in the way you have to apply it, but you can achieve the same results as with acrylic, or oils. I think you confuse painting with water colors as a stylistic fluid look, rather than using them as opaque paint. Its all in what you desire to achieve, and how you want your work to look. If you want to get huge spreads of color over a vast sheet of paper, then yes, it gets complicated and very "iffy" as to what happens. You could call that hard, or you could say that was fun to see the surprises that occurred.
I disagree....watercolour is not easiest....not at all...but great to hear somebody is honest and bold in opinion
admire your teachings...learning is prompto during the fall.
Honestly, I think just getting started is hard. Once the paint brush is wet, whether it be oil, acrylic or water, it gets a heck of a lot easier.
Water color is easy to start with, you don't have to have to much equipment and space, they are easy to clean and they are much chiper to start. Problem is water color is more unforgiving than oil. To me in oil you have more artistic freedom, but problem is they are more expensive to start, you need more space, more equipment, they are harder to clean, they are smelly and this can be problem if you don't own your own house.
Stefan says go darker if you mess up, but then your painting will be under exposed just like photo will be if you mess up exposure.
From perspective of most people water color are easiest for beginners, but harder to master because of unforgiveness and unpredictability. Still they are some rare artist who are so good in water color that theirs paintings look like real photographs.
Im in a rush. Going up to Crisp Point MI. I get back, Ill finish watching.. TY
👍🙏🏆🎨
I want to see them all! I was fortunate to get to see a rare exhibition of the masters’ drawings (Durer, Fragonard, Rubens, etc) while I was in Frankfurt, Germany. I found them more lively and passionate than the finished oil paintings. Any more, there’s new papers, mediums, and materials that enable new adventures in art-regardless of the media.
I have a heck of a time with watercolor. I have been a lifelong acrylic artist. I can make my acrylics look like watercolor, and they stay where they are. So, for me, watercolor is difficult because it can be re-hydrated and moves around too much.
I have done a few oils, and I find I can do okay, I just need to remember the drying time is longer than with acrylic.
Practice replaces all the theory about the difficulty level of a medium. I find the transition from one medium to another the most difficult ... but it is transitory. I LOVE oils but have found that it is best (for me) used in my studio. Acrylics do well for me when I am painting outside as transporting an almost dry painting is easier but I always have a wee watercolour set in my purse for those "in-between" times. Let's face it, any medium has its learning curve and the thing I like best is that I have a choice. I also love the challenge.
Most of the shows I have put my work into thought the medium was oil, not because I was trying to make acrylics look like oils, but because I make acrylics look like reality and paint realistically. I have dominantly used acrylics in my art forever. (35-40 years) Not because I thought it was harder, or better, but because it is what I could afford. Now that I work oils, I still work my underpainting with acrylics, and I think that because I have learned the technique for acrylic as a non forgiving medium, oils are easy. Everything in my experience tells me that your idea of oils and acrylics is backwards from what I see happening with the two mediums... I goto museums to see great art. Most museums have more oils paintings simple because there were not any alternatives throughout history, we have only just gotten acrylics, so the Robert Bateman's of the world haven't filtered their way into history just yet. But you might also think about the stereotypical thinking of galleries and museum curators about oils vs acrylic. What do they think they can get more for? They have more to say about a traditional medium which they can promote from the perspective of history.
Love the analogy where you illustrate the artistic license as the "space between the notes", that's where the interpretation comes from. How do you see the red ball? Where is the lighting coming from, how red? How shall I paint it? How large, where in the composition is it placed? What is the central focal point? How do I want to light it? Etc. Very thought provoking. "Don't sleep with him the first night, go home and think about it" Truer words were never spoken lol. BTW, we lost a beautiful artist, Richard Schmid, on April 18, 2021 :-(. Paint on my friend
Someone said that if you can master watercolour you can work with any mdium.
because you can really only work light to dark. its kind of a big problem depending on what you are trying to do
It is actually the other way around. If you master oil, you can paint acrylic and watercolor. This is what Stefan teaches constantly!!
I have found you can resize watercolor on top of paint layers. I spray gelatine mixed with water and alum on top and refresh the surface.
love these videos!
Hi Stefan, love lisening and watching your painting content its been so insightful on my painting journey!
I would love to know what the ajustable light your are using is called so i could try to get one for myself to use.
Keep up to good work!
Hi Stefan, I wonder what you think of watermixable oils. I began to paint with them years ago because I painted at home. I still do but there's no-one to have objections. I use paste to keep the paint 'buttery'.
I hate them
I agree. I’ve painted with watercolours for several years, (not proper art, just cutesy animals) I’m trying to learn oil painting, and to me it is like painting with butter. With watercolours the colours mix on the paper themselves but with oils I have to plan the colours and the spontaneity goes out the window. Oil painting is definitely the hardest medium.
Thank you for another great information.
Lots of great info in this excellent video. I'd love to see one dedicated to framing!
Thank you for sharing your views on this subject matter!
Thanks
Stefan, I sure miss the real classes and your teaching. Studying with the videos, just listening to it in the background, almost as motivating.
Watercolours are like chess and other mediums are like checkers, in comparison. If you want to do a lovely watercolour, you better plan way ahead.
well it depends on what you are using the watercolors for. if you are doing competitions in watercolor there is a whole other world. if you do illustrations or drawings in pencil or ink and you just want to colorize them you can use basic watercolor washes very qickly and effectively
I think every medium has its own appeal, if I’m painting watercolour I don’t want it to look like oils and vice versa, I don’t think any mediums are “hard” I think it’s all down to what you enjoy using most, I find a lot of the myths about the restrictions of watercolours are from people who have never painted with or haven’t learned how to use them. 🙂
I stick with watercolour and gouache for now because its affordable for me and i don't have the studio space to paint oil, the last oil painting I did received a lot of complaints on the turpentine smell and paint smell and for taking up space :( i love oil painting though~
I used to do oils all the time but my husband couldn't take the odour. I switched to acrylic and watercolor. Everyone tells me to do washes, I often wondered but never knew. Thank you.
Have you ever watched Shibasaki? His 5 min watercolor of Rose Flower demonstrates putting down heavy pigment, then pulling for value.
@@strange-universe I have not watched ' Shibasaki ' but I will as soon as I find him. Thank you.
Do you happen to have a demo in watercolor or acrylics. I am painting a rose and I would like to know more about putting dark color first then the next steps.?
always the best
I don't think you can start with the darks first in watercolor. I'm pretty sure you have to start with the lights first.
If you plan your painting, you can definitely bring in the darks in the very early stages, and you will end up with clearer, richer colors.
@@TheLeahsKitchen yes!
Sounds like you have forgot what is to paint with watercolour, either never tried, imho.
Thanks for another great video!
"Even if you had all your marbles..." lol (37:56)
By the way, I thought I read that the quote about using ugly color for the skin of Venus was by Delacroix.
(41:00) "Don't sleep with him the first date..." and THEN... "you gotta blow it to know it!" ?? o m g LOL
Great video !
I thought watercolor is hard. This video makes me rethink how I should paint with watercolors, though. I am afraid to paint with oil paints.
Dazzelated Watercolours are hard to do well ! He is wrong. You can do simple watercolours, but to do well, especially the darks, you will lose the luminosity, if you are not careful. I’ve done all of them, watercolours are by far the most difficult.
@@maxineboxer9714 I appreciate your insights (, as well. )😊
@@maxineboxer9714 agree.
I think he didn't try watercolor...
@@teodygaspar
He seems primarily paint with oil so he might not.
It has been a while since I commented but there are several techniques (ways) to paint with watercolors so some of them are easier...I would say.
Like that bit, ‘You can’t tell God - well, I can.’
Love your video's...
James Gurney is no slouch with watercolour and he uses white gouache all the time. It’s fine.
Yes, oils are hard! I am just starting to paint with it and they are really hard!
"oh yes, I have been reading about you" :DDDDD
Thank you so much:) You inspired me to put together a web site and contact a gallery - haven't heard back from them so I will take that as a no:) Well, there is always Etsy.
@dannimac Thank you - that is good advice. There are not many galleries in my area, and I may try another. I walk through them and see some really excellent paintings and think I am too much a beginner - then see others and think mine aren't so bad:)
Arti Rikard here
That cheeky student’s spirit animal is a13 year old spay cat
Oil paininting is too expensive. How can you freely experiment when it cost so much?
I buy house paint samples and use it on 90lb mixed media paper. You can do lots of experimentation, be very bold and it is incredibly cheap. You can also get a jar of mistinted samples for .50 or a dollar at Lowe's, or a whole gallon for $9 Sometimes you can find some great colors. The you can finish the work with nice acrylics or oil paint.
Stephan sure has patience!
Watercolors are not easier than oils....LOL I love your videos but this made me laugh. There are many reasons you see a lot of watercolors at shows. One is that they dry fast and can be sold instantly. They are smaller to store, easier and cheaper to frame, easier to scan and make prints from. Many people enjoy the loose effects you get from working wet on wet. They are cheaper to approach from a beginners standpoint. The painting itself is not easier.
Completely agree, watercolour's are ridiculously hard
...watercolor is hard even most so called professional.
9:23......priceless!
My friend used oil...but he tried watercolor, got muddy color. He says...very hard!
different skills. one might inform the othe rbut certainly not the same thing
@@MrKongatthegates Sargent is an oil painter but very good in watercolor even Sorolla too. Even a self taught Chamberlain he do oil and watercolor. Oil can be erase watercolor cannot...so hard.
Lol so many upset watercolour painters. Have done all. Oil is by far the hardest. Sure maybe you could turn so,etching mediocre put with a bit of practise, but to do something great is very difficult. Also, watercolours create a lot of effects that oils and acrylics don’t get. I feel it’s easier to hide behind these effects whereas with oil and acrylic, you must create your own style and unique strokes. Probably unpopular opinion but he’s right…. I don’t go anywhere to look at watercolours.
You made me laugh on this video, « God » woman driving lol etc
one thing about watercolor is that you can only do it on paper, so that diminishes the worth. they are great for studies and students but work on paper is not as permanent and not as valuable
I have done them on panel boards
28 watercolorists watched this video
Comment on your “long caravan of mature women”........Stefan, what were you thinking! ,,,😂😂😂
One of those women really wanted her opinions to be heard above all others. Oh no all frames are Mitered. Oh no water color is by far the hardest. I would pull my hair out. At one point I was waiting for... "listen you old bat" lol
I'm better at sketching/drawing than painting and I do find water color easier.
Oil bigot. Painting is pigment and media. Master the media and appreciate the difference.
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