Space Garden: Acrylic Painting on Canvas

I have been using reference photos and trying to follow them very closely to help improve my acrylic painting. This is a painting that I tried doing without really using references. I think it's a good exercise to see what needs work and what muscle memory the mind already has down. It is a little more complicated, for me at least, I am pretty dependent on references and I still can't get those 100%.

Despite things I need to work on I love the theme of this painting and wanted to get better at rendering before producing more paintings like this. It's the whole "learning to walk before you can run". I can't make something that doesn't exist without knowing how to create things that do exist, which is a typical route to take when doing surreal kind of things.

I think the canvas and size makes a difference. I am using a medium textured canvas pad. Trying to get smooth areas is more difficult especially using a small surface with small brushes. Also, I used a gloss mixing medium for some glazing and that makes photographing difficult. I do recommend the gloss medium because it does look nice in person, however, I think using a matte mixing medium with a gloss varnish might be ideal. I have not tried that yet, but it sounds good in theory.

As usual, Liquitex basics and professional on a Fredrix 8''x10'' canvas pad medium texture.

Here's the process:
 
 
 

I started with painting a black background. I mixed the black with a small amount of ultramarine blue. The clouds are black, pthalo blue and pthalo green. I kind of scrubbed the clouds in with some wet and dry brushing. I really like very stiff brushes for that. Starting with the darkest colors first I started with a black base for the tree.

 
 
 

I added some detail and some unrealistic lighting to the tree.

 
 
 

Here is just some fun with some new liner brushes I got. I really suggest these for any kind of veining. They are the brushes with really long bristles. Detail brushes with short bristles are impractical for this since they can't hold very much paint.

 
 
 

Now adding some "space flowers" which is when I realized small brushes were not getting enough paint down on the canvas but I kept trying.

 
 
 

Now getting the base down for the space girl. I can see some anatomy studies for paining would be very beneficial to have done before this.

 
 
 

I think maybe the space leaves coming down from the tree might have been a bad decision, or at least they should have been rendered a different way. I felt like it was missing something before adding them. So, I added them anyway. I still consider much of what I do practice and it's always good to make decision that are "mistakes" that's the best way to learn. Although, that's why some of my paintings and drawings sit a while, bad decisions can lead to extra work. Although, it's good to make them, and then learn for next time.

 
 
 

 
 
 
The finished painting

 
 
 

Thanks for looking 😁