Tips to Help Anyone Paint Incredible Flowers
Flowers are unique and beautiful, and painting them is a time honored tradition undertaken by some of the world’s greatest artists. It’s a centuries long tradition of capturing color and texture, but it’s informed by basic artistic techniques. Here are some tips to help everyone, from amateur to master, in the pursuit of creating incredible flower paintings.
Outlines
Using outlines in monochrome, you can map out the shape of the flower petals, without distracting your eyes. If you use monochrome, you’ll be able to discern where and how your brush should be positioned to add color. Try to go for a slightly darker color than what’s on your background, or utilize pencil if you’re applying paint directly to canvas.
Begin with a Base
When you paint flower petals, you should use a big brush. Mix the colors you want and take the primary color for each flower to begin with. Paint the entire petal with that primary color. Once it dries, use your alternate color (usually white, or something to define shadows) and fill in the detail.
Surroundings Help
Your flower paintings can be much stronger and more visually appealing if you paint a background instead of a single color. In some cases, your subject will look more unique if it’s placed in the context of a field. It also helps bring out the realism in your paintings, which is important for life-like studies. Try to highlight small details, and use photographs to try and jog your memory a bit.
About the Author: Phineas Upham is an investor at a family office/ hedgefund, where he focuses on special situation illiquid investing. Before this position, Phin Upham was working at Morgan Stanley in the Media and Telecom group. You may contact Phin on his Phineas Upham website or LinkedIn page.