OOAK Mushroom pixie boy Water Mixable Oil Painting with Artisan and Duo Aqua Holbein Paints WIP Tutorial

 

Here is the final post for this Mushroom Pixie Boy Sculpture 

Originally I got the Artisan Water Mixable oil paints from Michaels. At the time that was the only water mixable oil paint brand that they carry, I'm not sure if they now carry other brands currently. Artisan is fine to use but compared to Duo Aqua water mixable oils, they dry more slowly, appear to have more gloss, and are more wet.

I got my Duo Aqua paints from Blick art supplies. These paints are more stuff, appear more matte, and dry quicker than Artisan. These are the only two water mixable oil brands that I have tried. I do intermix them with one another. Interestingly Duo Aqua states it can be mixed with acrylic paint, where Artisan says not too. 

Usually I just paint straight from the tube. These paints are now very old at this point. I first got them around 2009, so about 15 years old. Some of the colors are stiffer but I used very little painting medium mixed together in the paint to get it to its original consistency.  

Here I spread the paints on a flat plate palette. These paints dry much more slowly than acrylics. 

Not shown was that I had made the skin tone less green still with acrylics. I had tried before to paint straight with water mixable oils on a white or off-white surface but it really increased the painting time, since the paints are more translucent, brush strokes would show through and it took more coats to get even coverage, etc. So painting over a base coat of acrylics first I think was great since I'm just concentrating on the shading aspect.  

I tried two ways: first is I just applied alittle bit of water mixable oil on top of the acrylic and tried to spread it across the surface. The problem with this is that the paint did not glide so well. then I thought to add oil or painting medium on top to help it spread better. 

The final version how I shade with water mixable oils is to just repaint the full surface with a base coating of a similar color to what is underneath. Then apply the shading colors on top and blend all together. 

I painted light colors to dark colors. This way when I have to repaint the areas where the paint went to the wrong spot, its much easier to correct than going dark to light. Usually when I am at this stage of painting, I have the model/sculpture firmly attached to the base. This way I don't have to handle the main figure anymore. In this case I wasn't use if I wanted to keep the figure independent from the base. In the end, I decided to permanently attach it to the base using magic smooth, as I thought the figure shouldn't be handled too much after painting. This way, the base can be the main handling point instead of the figure. So I made more work for myself by not attaching the figure to the base before final painting. 

Here is what the base looked like unfinished. I used hearty clay over a wire and tin form armature. Then attached it the wooden base with magic smooth. Also I used magic smooth for grass texture. 

Here I am painting the mushroom cap. I used Artisan Cadmium reds paint. They have great coverage, but they do contain cadmium so handle with care. Usually, I am always wearing nitrile gloves while painting nowadays.  If you remember from part one of painting with acrylics, I had previously painted the white spots in acrylic, but here I just covered the whole area with red and readded the white spots at the end. It was just easier this way and smoother blending for me. 

This one is currently for sale in my Etsy Shop if interested: 

https://blueorandasculpts.etsy.com/listing/4345332096/ooak-woodland-mushroom-elf-sculpture

Watch My Painting Process: 

If you'd like to see a quick video of my painting progress, you can watch it here. 

Finishing a Polymer Clay Elf Pixie | Part 2: Water Mixable Oil Painting on Fantasy Sculpture WIP

Completed pictures below: