MATERIALS with Mathew Lynn
Basic Materials List - Portraits, Figures, Still Life, Scapes, Abstraction
This is my simple guide for drawing and painting, with only basic and essential lists.
Drawing, Studies and Process Work
For dedicated drawers not planning to paint, just bring in all your normal equipment!
Follow this guide below (you don’t need everything!), sketchbook and pencils being the most important.
• A4 Sketchbook or paper
• Pencils - bring in a range such as H, B, 2B, 6B
• Staedtler rubber (we will also trim this into wedges for precision removals)
• Knife for sharpening
• 30cm Ruler (only if you think you’d like to use a grid)
• Any other drawing materials you like - such as charcoal, pastels, Conte Crayon etc.
• Gouache or Watercolour set (or just your oils or acrylics)
• Water media pad such as Art Spectrum Draw & Wash Pad 210gsm (Smooth)
• Full size watercolour sheets 56x76cm 300gsm
• Oil sketch pad such as Canson Figueras 290gsm
• A larger cheap Cartridge Pad can also be great for big loose process sketches and practicing marks, particularly for abstraction.
Oil Painting Materials
Colours
Essential for rendering basic skin tones, but also most things. These are also the 11 essential colours for my Colour Mixing Workshop, that covers all opaque and transparent painting in the context of the broader history of painting and all genres.
• Titanium White
• Ivory Black
• Ultramarine Blue (make sure you have standard Ultramarine)
• Yellow Ochre
• Indian Red (Red Oxide that has a purple hue)
• Burnt Umber
• Alizarin Crimson (or cheaper equivalent)
• Cadmium Red (or cheaper equivalent)
• Cadmium Yellow Light (or cheaper equivalent – if in doubt bring Lemon Yellow)
• Phthalo Blue
• Phthalo Green
Also, these additions can be very useful (or any other colours you like!):
• Cadmium Orange (or cheaper equivalent)
• Cobalt Blue (or cheaper equivalent)
• Magenta
• Quinacridone Rose (the only way to get opaque hot pink!)
• Dioxazine Purple
Oil Brushes (long handle style brushes, also used for Acrylics)
Brush Range
In general, it’s good to have this range of sizes and numbers which you can spread across the various types of hog bristle or stiff synthetic style brushes. Remember, these numbers are sometimes doubled!
No.12 x 2 - No.10 x 2 - No.8 x2 - No.6 x 2 - No.4 x 2 - No.2 x 2 - No.1 x 2
As a simple guide, the big brushes (No.12 & No.10) can be Cheap Hog Bristle 582 ROUND (also great for dry blending and punishing), and the remainder can be a mixture of cheap and better quality Hog Bristle or Synthetic ROUND or FILBERT.
Acrylic painters only need one of every size generally, and the NEEF 95 Stiff Synthetic FILBERT would be my strong recommendation for you. These are incredible brushes and I recommend the Filbert shape, at least for people starting out.
Other Oil Painting Materials
• Palette - could be disposable, but it’s better and far less frustrating if it’s a modern rectangular board shape (30x40cm or roughly A3) - make sure your palette has plenty of mixing space. Two cheap pieces of prepared board in A3 size sitting on a table is just as good, the spare one can be handy when you run out of space but want to keep those colours on the first board going.
• Double Dipper - for separate medium and solvent. Get the open style with the widest openings so you can get your big brushes easily in and out.
• Mediums & Solvents - I recommend Galkyd Lite Medium (quick-drying) and Gamsol Odourless Solvent. You can also use Artist’s Linseed Oil, Stand Linseed Oil or Artist’s Safflower Oil and combine these with odourless solvent. Gamblin 3-in-1 is also a good option.
• Rags, paper towels - plenty of these
• Cotton buds - extremely helpful for subtle removal of paint in tight spots, great for portraits.
• Spare containers - for solvent, or mixing things on the go.
• Palette knife - you may like to have couple of these in different shapes.
• Anything else you like to make marks with or push paint around, such as spatulas, scrapers etc.
• A canvas or canvas board (or a few of them) - oil painting paper is also fine, but can be more difficult to work on and transport. Gesso Boards are also great, and allow you to work in a very different way on a slippery surface.
• It is always a good idea to wear disposable Nitrile gloves (non-latex and tougher) when painting and handling oil paint and mediums, they’re at most supermarkets.
• Use your GAMSOL or odourless solvent for clean-up in class.
• I highly recommend you bring in a proper stainless steel style oil brush washer with strainer and a sealable lid. They can be found for less than $30 on eBay, and it means (if necessary) you can wash some of your brushes on the go properly, and also carry it home without spills.
• Taking your brushes home wrapped in glad wrap for a proper clean and wash is probably the best option, as described above. Many people have a great system for doing it straight away in class.
Acrylic Materials
Colours
Similar to the oil colours above, but be aware that Acrylics sometimes don’t come in exactly the same colour names. If in doubt have these essential colours at least.
• Titanium White
• Ivory Black
• Ultramarine Blue (make sure you have standard Ultramarine)
• Yellow Oxide
• Red Oxide
• Burnt Umber
• Alizarin Crimson (or cheaper equivalent)
• Cadmium Red (or cheaper equivalent)
• Cadmium Yellow Light (or cheaper equivalent – if in doubt bring Lemon Yellow)
• Phthalo Blue
• Phthalo Green
• Brushes – follow the basic range and advice above in the oil brushes section, but you’ll only need one of each size because you are constantly washing your brush.
I find the Synthetic Hog Bristle Brushes particularly wonderful for acrylic! NEEF 95 Stiff Synthetic Filbert is my strong recommendation for Acrylic painters, as they have a perfect balance of firmness combined with optimal flow from the brush, it’s the perfect acrylic brush.
• Medium – can be a basic Acrylic Painting Medium, Gel Medium, Impasto Medium, Retarder Medium etc. I personally like to use just water.
• Acrylic palette/s with a flat surface, or just an A3 piece of Perspex (and perhaps a second one), plenty of mixing space is always better with Acrylic!
A large flat Decor style container with a lid can be great as you can create a wet environment to slow down drying time, and the lid doubles as an extra mixing space.
Some people also love the disposable palette pads (A3 at least please!) because your deposited paint often dries out several times in a normal session.
I’ve also seen people have a lot of success with sheets of baking paper stretched over a wet rag, you can also buy a ‘Stay-Wet’ palette from art stores.
• Spare containers and a large water container
There will usually be empty containers wherever I am, but bring one if you’re not sure. A common bad habit is not using a big enough water container on your table, or forgetting to replace your water often.
• Rags, sponges, paper towels, cotton buds, scraper, or anything else you like to use.
• A canvas or canvas board (or a few of them), you may also like to use heavy water medium paper.
• I personally love using full size 300gsm watercolour sheets when I use Acrylic, and having some water media paper on hand is always a great idea if you need to do a quick colour process sketch to solve something. A cheaper water media pad (at least 210gsm) can be great for this problem solving too, and then you’ve got your piece of paper in a convenient size.
• You can also have an even cheaper Cartridge Paper Pad for fast process sketches and practicing marks you might want to make in your main painting.
Important! In class we need to discard the bulk of unwanted acrylic paint by scraping onto paper towel, not washing everything down the sink.
Gouache & Watercolours
Gouache
Gouache may have some different colour names but refer to the acrylic colour above for reference.
Try to get Red Oxide for your earth red, this is especially important for portraits and the Colour Mixing exercises.
Windsor & Newton Gouache comes in more or less all the colours listed above, including Cadmiums, Alizarin Crimson and ‘Red Ochre’, but it’s an expensive option. Art Spectrum has a simplified range without a Red Oxide. Daler-Rowney Gouache has a somewhat simplified list also where you’ll have to do some translating, but they do have an Indian Red.
Gouache is also, in many respects, more like oil painting, because unlike acrylics which always dry waterproof, gouache can be continually pushed around and reanimated.
Gouache is also extremely good for colour mixing studies, though you are better to do this with your principle medium.
I absolutely love Gouache!, and I find it wonderful (and preferable) for small colour studies and process sketches! My oil painting technique is beginning to mimic the discoveries I make in Gouache.
Watercolour
Watercolour colours follow a different system and can be quite specific, favouring particular transparent pigments, but you can use any that you have, and I can give you advice on this, or simply use a basic watercolour set and you should be covered.
Watercolour most closely resembles glazing in oil painting, so can be wonderful for getting the feel of working transparently. The most important skill in watercolour is the dialogue between the white of the paper, and how it illuminates your colours.
• Synthetic watercolour brushes in a range of sizes and shapes: fine, medium and a large. Also Mops, Squirrel and Hake brushes.
• Appropriate palettes for colours and mixing, make sure you have plenty of flat space too.
• Water container and extra containers for mixing
• Rags, paper towels, cotton buds
• Watercolour paper or watercolour pad
• Cheaper water media pads are also great to have around for experiments and to practice marks. Try an Art Spectrum Draw & Wash Pad 210gsm for studies, or an even cheaper Cartridge Paper Pad for fast process sketches and to practice marks.