Acrylic Portrait Painting Lessons
I help artists who want to paint people better, learn how to use acrylic effectively to create lifelike, realistic portraits they will be proud of.
I offer lessons both online and at my studio in Eau Claire WI (by Saint Paul-Minneapolis)
You can learn quite a bit for free here at my blog, below.
When you’re ready to go even further with your acrylic portrait painting, my premium online courses will show you how to create a fantastic portrait, step by step, with easy to follow written and video instruction. I also offer personal critiques to help you when you’re stuck.
It’s almost like having me in the studio with you!
You’re at the right place to learn how to paint realistic portraits in acrylic. Read on for more art instruction!
New Painting in Progress: “Come as Children”
Here is a new painting in progress–a 16 x 20 acrylic on canvas. This will be a book cover for a compilation of Charles Spurgeon’s devotionals for children, called “Come Ye Children.” Based off this photo I took of my two children when we were hiking in northern Wisconsin. Reference Photo In Progress Painting I start off very faint, just blocking in the colors with glazes. I mix about 90% clear acrylic medium to about 10% paint and just block in the composition, suggesting where the future colors will go. Here is my palette… Normally, I use burnt sienna, but to challenge myself and also to enhance the color harmony within the painting, I omitted it. Video Demonstration The first layers consisted of raw sienna, yellow ochre, phthalo blue and indian yellow for the background, and then for the posts: raw umber dark, ultramarine blue and napthol crimson. I blocked in the blue jeans with phthalo blue, and my daughter’s pants with napthol crimson. I’ll be posting more on this and show you the process of how the painting develops. Have a blessed day, Share Your Thoughts! If you have any comments or questions about what I wrote, please leave me your feedback below! I will personally get back to you. Can you help me spread the word? Please share this post with your family and friends by using the social media links on the side or below. Thank you!... read more
Original Painting of a Now-Non-Existent Building
Here is a painting I did of a building in my town that is now no longer there. I title this “The Original Upland,” (24″ x 30″, acrylic on hardboard) because it used to be the home of Upland Distributing, Inc. a vacuum and filtration sales and service company where I used to work years ago, as a traveling service technician. While I worked there I built up a relationship with my boss, the owner. Since I knew the building was slated to be demolished soon, and the owner would have to move his business into another building after being there for nearly 20 years, I thought a painting would be an encouragement to him. It would help keep the memories alive. It was something I felt God wanted me to do to bless him, and I waited for a while, but when I knew that demolition was imminent, I got out my camera and took some pictures. Maybe I’m a newbie at camera lenses, or I just tried to do the best I could with my small digital camera, but backed up by the buildings on the other side of the street, I couldn’t get the angle I wanted for image. So I took a few images and “frankensteined” them together on Photoshop, using the warp and perspective tool to change the angle of the building to match the photos seamed together. Never mind the cut-up-half floating car! That won’t be in the actual painting! With this layout, I now had an image to paint! Here’s the... read more
5 Steps to Shade Your Portraits Right
How do you get your portrait paintings to look lifelike? Here’s a 5-step printable guide to get you on the road to realism. Click here to download the full resolution 8.5″ x 11″ printable file. It will help get you on the right track in using color and value and correctly, so that your acrylic portrait painting looks lifelike. All of this is in a standard 8 1/2″ x 11″ printable guide that you can keep for easy reference. Although it will not solve all your painting problems,you’ll be able to use it as an excellent tool to get your painting going in the right direction, or even give you some solid principles to go by if you’re stuck. Let me know what you think of it and how it helps. Be blessed in your painting adventures and I’ll be in... read more
How to Join My Portrait Painting School
I have had a few people question me, how do I log in and purchase your portrait painting course? Sometimes the technology is a bit challenging to figure out. Let me show you exactly how to do it.
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The Things We Artists Do for Art
It’s amazing the things you have to do sometimes to get a painting to look realistic. I’ve been commissioned to do a painting of the five loaves and two fishes for a book cover illustration, a commentary on the book of Mark in the New Testament. I didn’t want to copy a stock photo (illegal) but I didn’t want to just make it up (not very realistic) So I bought some fish, some flatbread and a basket. Took the pics just as the sun was setting. Then I cooked the fish tonight and ate it with the bread. Best fish I’ve had in a long time! 🙂 Here are a few pics that I took… Even though this is not my usual subject matter–portraits–it’s good to do a still life once in a while to keep up with your color, shape, and value rendering skills. Many of you have seen this painting on Facebook already, but I wanted to get this posted to my blog. Have a blessed weekend!... read more
Why Not to Give Up on Your Acrylic Portrait Painting
It’s easy to get frustrated in the middle of painting an acrylic portrait. Possibly your skin tones aren’t looking natural, or the values are off. Maybe the portrait just doesn’t look like the person you’re trying to capture. When you’re going for realism, and it just isn’t happening, what do you do?
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How I do Shading with Acrylic (Video)
While teaching art classes lately, I’ve discovered one of the most challenging things for my students to learn is how to shade.
For artists and art appreciators, shading is a mysterious thing. We wonder how to do it, or how others did it.
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How I Learned to Save on Acrylic Paint
One of the biggest costs for a painter is the canvas and, of course, the paint. I’ve been painting for over 20 years and during that time, I’ve had many fine brands of acrylic to choose from like Liquitex, Windsor & Newton, and Golden. But tubes of paint are…
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More is Not Always Better
As many of my readers know, I just started teaching my very first drawing class at my studio this week. I created a 5-session course to help beginning artists learn skills that will help them create realistic, detailed portraits they can be proud of.
Since I normally am a “fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants” kind of guy, I figured I would do better and create an intricate, elaborate lesson plan with 50-some drawing exercises (a little exaggeration) and that the students could knock them out in about 10-15 minutes. No problem, right?
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A Few Simple Tips to Draw Better Portraits
People are one of the most challenging things for an artist to draw. To capture the unique appearance and personality of a person by using the right lines and shading takes patience and practice. Even as a professional portrait artist who loves his craft, sometimes after…
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