Still Life Oil painting can look timeless if executed properly. There are so many still life classic paintings done by old masters of painting. They are rich and they exude beauty. Let’s discuss what you can do to make an exquisite still life oil painting.
Prepare yourself before diving into still life oil painting:
First things first, if you are planning to make still life oil painting, practicing lots of still life sketching helps a lot. It’s definitely tempting to use colors right from the beginning but patience pays in this case. You have got to study lots of still life objects and replicate them using pencils/charcoal.
Try sketching them perfectly by giving correct amount of shading. Don’t just shade, study why a particular area is darker than another and vice versa. Observe the direction of light and the formation of shadow and include everything in your sketch.
Once you are confident after making multiple pencil sketches, you will be so much more at ease at handling still life in oil colors. Again, make sure that you have a nice composition for your still life. Background is equally important, you can use a classic drapery as your background like used in all time classic still life paintings.
Make sure you take care of perspective and measurements while making a preliminary drawing on the canvas. Now, it’s time to dive into coloring and where the real fun part starts.
An approach to still life oil painting:
For my first still life oil painting, I used almost six objects arranged tactfully. The background was a light yellow wall and blue drapery. How you approach the still life now depends on your level of convenience with achieving the exact tones and textures of the still life objects.
I concentrated on one object at one sitting, kept on working on it and finished it at one go. If this approach doesn’t work for you, you can apply several layers of oil paint and finish one object in several sittings. What’s important in the end is that your object should look and feel exactly the same as real object (unless you are making an abstract/experimental still life).
I took almost five/six days to finish all six objects of my still life. Next I took care of background, shadows and final finishing touches and voila, my first still life oil painting was ready. This painting is admired by anyone who views it. They are amazed at the 3D look and the similarity with the real objects that this painting has.
Time to take action:
Once you have practiced enough of pencil sketches of still life, find some interesting objects to make an oil painting. Arrange them to get a good composition and start your still life oil painting. Giving a try to the classic still life oil painting is worth the efforts!
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