The latter half of 2022 introduced the world to Midjourney, an image-generation AI capable of imitating the art styles of famous painters and illustrators, and ChatGPT, an AI chatbot that can produce written content and stories. Sigh. We’re in a bit of a pickle here folks. Without even touching other debates, how exactly do you find the will to learn how to paint in a world where a Discord bot could do your hobby better than you in a few keystrokes?
Here’s the thing, though: If you find the process of making something is rewarding on its own, without any other standards of value or “worth it”-ness, who cares whether it’s still “worth it” to learn how to paint?
In this article, we’ll be talking about how to get started with painting this 2023 even with the singularity right around the corner. They won’t even be scary suggestions like learning through traditional methods, but instead just fun and easy ways to start for people who genuinely just want to start painting as a hobby.
The Materials You’ll Need to Learn How to Paint
Before we actually start learning how to paint, we need to pick out materials and tools. Your paint of choice is what artists call a “medium” and no, it’s not the psychic kind. Basically, your medium can be acrylic paint, watercolor, tempera, oil paint, etc. The easiest paint to use when you’re learning how to paint is acrylic paint. It dries quickly, blends easily, and with a little dilution, you can get it to look more like watercolor without having to deal with the steeper learning curve of watercolor paint.
Oil painting has a reputation for being one of the harder paints to learn how to paint with and for good reason — it takes ages to dry! According to Art In Context, an oil painting can take as long as 24 hours to become dry to the touch but not to dry entirely since the drying period for an entire oil painting depends on how thick your oil paint is.
That said you might be wondering “Is it okay to paint with oil as a beginner?” and the answer is absolutely, yes! It’s just going to be a little harder, but if that’s really where you want to start, by all means. It’s your hobby and your free time.
Now onto the brands. If you’re working with watercolor or acrylic, as we assume most of you reading this are already planning on doing, you can choose between popular brands such as Himi and Miya which both produce watercolors as well as gouache, a watercolor-like paint.
GET THE HIMI WATERCOLOR PAINT SET
Mont Marte makes oil and acrylic paints. Both brands are quite affordable so you won’t look back in regret if you ever decide that painting just isn’t for you, but they’re also solid products that will make learning how to paint enjoyable instead of frustrating.
GET THE MONT MARTE ACRYLIC PAINT SET
Mont Marte even has these multiple shade sets that you can buy if you don’t want to spend time mixing your own paints or if you just don’t like the idea of mixing colors every time you need the same shade of light blue for your skies. The tubes may seem small, but trust me, those tubes go a long way since you’ll only use a few drops at a time on average if you’re not mixing your own colors.
You’ll also need brushes. Mont Marte makes great, affordable brush sets that have everything you will need as a beginner painter. If that’s too many brushes for you, Faber-Castell makes soft-grip, kid-friendly brushes that come in 4-piece sets.
Last, you need a paint palette and a sketchbook or canvas. These are cheap as heck and you can get them in bulk packs so you can throw out the older ones with too many paint layers anytime you want. For painting on, we recommend sketchbooks so you can store them easily. You’ll find that sketchbooks have numbers labeled GSM on them. That refers to the paper’s thickness. Generally speaking, the more GSMs the better since thicker paper will be able to hold its shape without warping or bleeding because of the paint.
How to Start Painting: 3 Methods That Won’t Scare You Into Imposter Syndrome and Never Painting Again
Do you fear that you will never be a great artiste? Fear not, dear reader, for these methods for learning how to paint are chosen to get you comfortable with the idea of making things first and really, just enjoying that process, without thinking about whether it’s good or whether you’re doing things “correctly”.
Method 1: Follow Bob Ross Videos
“We don’t make mistakes — just happy accidents.” is the encouraging reminder you’re going to get in virtually every Bob Ross video, especially during the earlier stages of the painting process where it feels like your painting is going to look worse than you can have possibly imagined. It’s a classic, but there’s a reason classics are classics: They work.
One thing about Bob Ross’ videos that you’ll have to watch out for though are the surprise mountain details he draws at random throughout his videos so you may want to wait and see the whole thing before you start your painting.
Method 2: Pick up a Paint by Numbers Kit
Paint by numbers may feel like cheating but man is it satisfying to see a painting come together by just filling in numbers with their corresponding colors. If you pay attention while completing your paint-by-number kit, you may even pick up a thing or two about what colors go well together, giving you a rough idea of how to make your own paintings.
Okay, it’s not the best method for learning how to paint since you won’t learn important things like perspective and color mixing with a paint-by-numbers kit. However, if your main problem is figuring out how to start (or to be more accurate, getting over the anxiety of starting something new), a paint-by-numbers kit is good for waking up your creative spirit. After you complete one, you can try painting freehand on your own using the paint-by-numbers kit as a reference.
Method 3: Follow a Painter on YouTube
The internet is an international university that’s literally right at your finger tips. You can easily follow channels dedicated to teaching absolute beginners how to paint. This guide from artsherpa is basically an acrylic painting class for people who have never picked up a paint brush or pencil in their life. It even goes over the basics of how to squeeze out acrylic paint (yes, there is a correct method of doing it so you don’t squeeze out the entire tube).
Method 4: Learn to Draw
Yes, we know this is a guide on how to paint, but it also won’t hurt to pick up a pencil and learn the basics, such as perspective and anatomy, with a pen and paper. You’ll be surprised what a difference understanding these make if you compare beginner painting work made by people who are absolute newbies to art and beginner paintings made by people who have tried some kind of visual art before, like drawing or photography.
Just Start Painting!
This doesn’t need any more explanation. Just close this tab and go start painting. Take your sketchbook or canvas out to the park or put a houseplant in front of you in your room as you paint. Starting a new hobby can be intimidating, but the sooner you start doing, the sooner you can have fun. And if being good matters to you, think of it this way: The sooner you can make mistakes, the sooner you can fix them.