Mini podcast - Acrylic journey

ENGLISH TRANSLATION: (UNCUT TEXT/Audio vers)

GUION acrylic painting

How many paintings have I painted so far?

You are going to get your asses twisted, or maybe not, but in reality I have painted so few that it still doesn't explain that I know how to defend myself with acrylic as I do. Why yes, there is knowledge to be shared from the traditional one, but it is like telling someone who only knows mathematics to paint you a picasso. You have to change the mentality very strongly.

When I was little I went to a small academy run by a friend of my mother. We couldn't afford to pay for it in full so she offered to clean. The academy was in the house itself, so in the end she cleaned more than her fair share... The routine was obnoxious and tedious for her so in the end we stopped going and knowing what I know now, I dislike if anything that she got to clean there. Anyway, we even did clay modeling. At that time I was painting six-legged giraffes. I was quite a revolutionary, especially finger painting.

I've always liked the traditional way, although I feel constant guilt when I waste material, such as paper. The funny thing is that I've been buying over the years and guess who has a mini warehouse of resources to spend. At least I won't be buying more for over a year X'D.

Back to the topic. Paintings. The previous one I painted was in February last year, as a challenge, in fact it's on sale at a ridiculous price in my Ko-fi store. Before that I was hitting the gouache, which requires smaller supports and takes up less space on my desk (the acrylic pots though...). Before that, it had been years. I painted a painting almost two meters long of an elephant and let's say that my client did not understand that the painting cost more than 120€ including material, support, car transportation (gasoline), ...it was not a hateful experience, but I killed myself to paint and as he was an acquaintance from when I went to elementary school, they tried to reconnect by forcing me to do things I hated. It ended up cold. It always gave the feeling that it was to get a cheaper price, even though it's not true. More than 11 years without seeing a person makes you suspicious of them.

3 paintings. 3 acrylic paintings with some lost proof out there that I must not remember anything about.

I didn't think so but acrylic is a technique that requires a lot of time and dedication. The surprising thing is that it takes time but not for what you think. Prepare the table, the protections if you don't have a studio, the water, the palette, mix colors to prepare everything, the cloth to clean, change the water several times...plus reserve with something that moisturizes and preserves the acrylic and that doesn't dry in your two hours of rest or that resists until the next day without making lumps. Add to that the cleanup at the end. Actually painting is faster than you think. Even with only 3 paintings painted, I'm not bad at it, I think.

What is acrylic? Talk about the technique

Excerpt from WIkis: "Acrylic paint is a kind of paint containing a plasticized material, fast drying paint, in which the pigments are contained in an emulsion of an acrylic polymer. Although soluble in water, once they dry they are resistant to water. It is particularly notable for its rapid drying time. Also, when drying, the tone is slightly modified, more so than in oil paints. Acrylic paint dates from the first half of the 20th century, and was developed in parallel in Italy and the United States.

"Latex" is the common name for polymers obtained by emulsion polymerization, and are colloidal dispersions of very small polymer particles in a continuous medium. Latexes can be applied in the manufacture of architectural paints, but also in wood adhesives (vinyl glue), paper paints or as additives for cement and concrete."

Components used to form emulsions: Emulsifiers, Surfactants, Protective colloids, Initiators, monomers, additional monomers, buffers, post additives....

Did you understand anything? You have to get a master's degree for this.

Which brushes to use?

You know that super good 50 euro unicorn hair brush? I don't recommend it. Look, between you and me, synthetics are now great unless you want to use bristle hair brushes which, because of their hardness, give another kind of texture when painting, but the great variety and quality of synthetics is already suggesting that it's time to give those poor squirrels a break.

It is also a good idea to find out how these animal hairs have been manufactured and obtained [X] and from there, decide if you are so concerned about the issue. The synthetics I have are already good for acrylic, gouache and watercolor as long as I take good care of them.

Canvases - my preference

The more cotton they have, the more expensive, like paper, the better. There are yardage sales, even if you have to assemble the frame yourself, and then there are the polyester blended options to prevent the fabric from tearing over the years. They tend to be thinner, from what I have investigated, but I have not done a thorough research to date because...I do not swim in money \o/ I do have, however, some canvases that come glued to hard cardboard slats, wood pulp that come out very cheap and that surely have little cotton. I'm trying everything! 

I used to use bristle brushes but they were not versatile and the brushstrokes were not accurate at all. Imagine wanting to make one line and you get ten, that was the result. For portraits with more lines or 'stripes' they are very good.

How to organize the space. Keep in mind that it's a different style, it takes up more space and doesn't allow many distractions.

I always end up putting on podcasts, series (although with these I end up losing the thread of either the painting or the series). Music is the key, have good lighting that does not vary and in short, that there is not much dust in the environment. Being able to move easily and not throw anything away is an achievement that I have achieved very recently. It only cost half a room to change! And money...oh money, always money.

I want to recommend, first of all, in case you have bad quality water coming out of your faucet, use filtered water and dry/wet cloth (normally wet is used for watercolors, but as I use it as it gets wet, in the end it is perfect for removing excess from the brush).

This painting in particular made me very excited because it was for a client and his family who wanted to have a great detail with the grandmother. I can not be more satisfied. From here I only hope to improve.

Something key to transfer the image/collage to the large canvas, was to divide the original image in a grid that in photography is called Rule of Thirds. In some schools, when we were kids they used to give us a sheet of paper divided with the same grid and we had to replicate the lines from the small board to the big one. It makes the process much easier, because you calculate square by square and then readjust everything at the end.

Tip! Don't get obsessed with the lines of the sketch, just mark the proportions to have them if not exact, at least very similar. Then with the acrylic or whatever you use, at the end you cover everything.

I hope you liked this short audio. Remember that you can ask me more specific questions about anything in our Discord or in comments.

A big kiss and thanks for listening and supporting me. 

I'm Paula Moros Batlle, aka Zalagath on the internet.

I'm an illustrator, writer in my free time and I study 3D when I don't have more tasks to do.

You can find me on Instagram, youtube, Tiktok, tumblr, patreon and ko-fi! Where, by the way, I have a store for physical products and order template.