Floral Still Life Acrylic Painting for Beginners

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Inspiration for a painting often strikes when walking around your garden.

Inspiration often ends when the mass of leaves and flowers you’ve picked are now strewn across your kitchen table, trying to pass themselves off as a still-life!

When you put paint to canvas, the whole thing looks unrealistic and a little dated. Is it the leaves? Is it the vase? Is the composition wrong? Why don’t the petals appear translucent?

Trying to transfer that feeling of simplicity and light into a studio still life can become very frustrating.

Greens that appeared bright outside suddenly become more muted inside, and if you try to paint them as brightly as you observed in the garden, they can appear fake.

Flower heads that appeared really white and flat outside now need added contrast to make them seem three-dimensional on the canvas.

This course will guide you through the process of creating an Impressionistic floral still-life painting in acrylics, recreating nature’s colour palettes from start to finish.

Over 3 hours of tuition, you’ll learn how to simplify and separate tonal values into areas of light and shadow, how to use warm and cool colours effectively and how to mix and balance naturalistic greens, creating a subtle acrylic palette and a realistic sense of sunlight hitting the leaves & petals.

£57.00

Categories: Beginners Art Courses, Still Life Acrylic Painting Courses

Description

Modern Simplicity, Classical Form

I’ve developed this painting course to show you how the arrangement of colours, composition and tonal value range result in a more contemporary painting that will still allow you to see good form.

We’ll be taking classical painting techniques to build up an in-direct floral painting in acrylics.

Once you’ve discovered the importance of accurate drawing, layout and establishing good tonal values – you’ll move on to using colour strings.

This method will develop your knowledge of pigments and allow you to create the perfect balance between warm and cool. It then means when you’re standing at the easel you can feel confident with your colours throughout every stage of the painting.

Working through these simple step-by-step tutorials, you’ll learn how to tune your eyes between subtle shifts of greys, creams and whites, mix a subtle modern colour palette, whilst still learning classical painting techniques.

In just a few hours you can create your own floral masterpiece!

What’s in the Course?

1 x Floral Still Life subject from start to finish, based in the studio working from a reference image.
8-downloadable video lessons, split into separate chapters that follow on sequentially.
Step-by-step instructional videos so that you can follow along at your own pace.
Each stage is a detailed yet easy-to-follow process.
Lifetime access, downloadable on separate devices.
Downloadable jpeg reference images, and reference line drawings.
Printable Class materials list, 3 1/2 hrs of detailed video instruction.

Lesson Breakdown

Lesson One

A Classical Approach

Learn how form is the key to creating realistic florals and how a tonal study of a Lily, illustrates the ‘background effect’.

Lesson Two

Materials & Set up

A visual introduction to all the materials, paints, mediums, palettes and canvas and how to use and apply an archival ground to your painting.

Lesson Three

Drawing Out

Clean lines, drawing realistic ellipses and learning to ‘see’ the tones.

Lesson Four

Tonal Underpainting

Developing brush techniques, blocking-in the pattern of darks and pushing your tonal range.

Lesson Five

Painting the background

Controlling tonal steps using a ‘value strip’, mixing perfect greys, using only two colours, and using my favourite acrylic medium to softly blend edges.

Lesson Six

Introducing Colour

Introducing how to use a colour wheel, and a simple palette, to mix the perfect greens whislt using a stay-wet palette to create your own ‘colour strings’.

Lesson Seven

Painting the Flower Heads

Tuning our eyes to observe the subtle shifts within the petals, painting the flower heads using 3 base mixes and balancing warm ochres and cool greys.

Lesson Eight

Impasto & Glazing

Using a palette knife to add flair and texture and then finishing with subtle glazing for that final glow to your painting.

Course Delivery

I’ve taken care to film everything from my perspective so you can see exactly what I’m doing as we go through the entire painting process in real-time. With over 3 hours of video instruction, full-color photographs and drawing guides.

This course has been developed with a beginner in mind, carefully going through the steps at a pace that introduces new colours and techniques slowly.

How is the course delivered?

When you purchase the course, you will receive an email with all the downloadable video links to the course. You then have to download and save the Video Lessons onto your home computer/iPad.

8 Downloadable Step-by-Step Video Lessons.
Over 3 hours of detailed video instruction that once downloaded – you have any time, anywhere access.
A ‘Getting Started & Materials List PDF‘ – which includes your materials list.
JPEG reference images used throughout the course, including the photo reference I demo with, a copy of my pencil sketch for the line drawing.
10 separate JPEG images to guide you through each stage.
NEW – Video timecode index to instantly jump back to any section of the lessons you’d like to revisit.
The video files are large (3GB) so you need a broadband internet connection and enough space on your computer hard drive.

Please note: You will not receive a DVD.

Cut by the Artist

I filmed, edited, and coloured the course myself (with a little help from Vanessa!) rather than working with a production company. Artists have different needs than editors so I wanted to cut the course like an artist, showing you exactly what I wanted to see when I was learning. I show all the real-time brushstrokes for the paintings so you don’t miss a step.

There are 3 main camera views I cover:

An over-the-shoulder view of the work – so you can see how I build up the painting as if you were standing behind me in the studio.A close-up of the brush contacting the canvas – with extreme close-ups, so you can see the grain of the canvas and the bristles in the brush.

Stable shot of the palette for when I pick up paint – see exactly how I mix colours. There is nothing worse than when the brush disappears from view, only to reappear with some fantastic new colour. Where did that colour come from?! How did it get mixed?

The palette view is very important, and not just at the beginning of the video. I want to show you every single mix I make, so I film with the palette directly next to the painting, then you can see shots of the palette throughout the course and gain a sense of my approach to colour mixing.

Colour Corrected Footage

Filmed under constant colour balanced conditions, so the paint colours are as accurate as can be. (Computer monitor screens and print-outs can vary)

Real-time filming – No long jumps in progress

I don’t like long jumps in progress when the paintbrush goes off camera, the shot changes and suddenly the picture has seemed to drastically improve.

I include all the stages so you can clearly see the progress of a work.

Course Requirements

Requirements for the Course

A broadband internet connection – the files sizes for the video lessons are quite large (3GB in total) so can take a while to initially download (depending on your internet speed.) Once downloaded, they are yours to keep forever, watch without buffering or take to the garden and watch away from an internet connection!

Enough free space on your Computer or iPad – You can download the files to a separate USB stick if you need extra storage.

A Colour Printer – to print out the reference images or access to a Print Shop.

Photo Printer Paper – I use Epson Archival Matte or Epson Photo Glossy.30 mins – 2 hr per session – You’ll need to be able to dedicate between 30 minutes to 2 hrs for each section, for example, the blocking-in might take 10 minutes, but the painting of the leaves may take a couple of hours.

What Students Say

Wow, many thanks for those really encouraging words. Very much appreciated. However I have to say I think some of the credit has to go to the excellent tutor! The video’s are extremely good. I’ve done many courses to improve my art, but never one which has been as successful as your video tutorials. Your attention to the detail of colour mixing is just so helpful. I’m now working on the Masterclass Still Life, which looks extremely exciting. – Sue, Floral Still Life Course

Hi Will,
I have followed your free online tutorials for a couple of years and have had some success. My husband decided to buy me this floral course and I have just finished the painting and I have to say it was such a lovely experience to go through the whole process with instruction along the way.
I am very pleased with the results and I’m inspired to take on new challenges. I would say that this course helps to free up one’s style to paint more loosely which I have struggled to get away from and often my style can look a bit cartoon like.
I’m currently trying my hand at oils and some portraiture and hope to be able to start another course soon.
Janet, Floral Still Life Course

Hi Will, Thank you for a very helpful video course. I learned so much, from how to do a tonal underpainting, to how to mix accurate colour strings, to how to add impasto touches to a painting. These are all lessons that I can apply to future paintings, and I’m looking forward to trying them out with my own still life compositions.
This course is very clearly explained step-by-step, so it’s suitable for beginners. But I also think that it’s suitable for more experienced painters, as so many skills are covered in the course.
I recommend this course for anyone wanting to create realistic and yet painterly pictures.
Jan R, Floral Still Life Course

Hi Will, I just completed the Floral Still Life painting from your online course. I enjoyed it immensely. I had not worked with only 5 colors before and now I feel confident about mixing greens and a lot of other colors.
Gail, Floral Still Life Course