Jagannath Paul - Bond of Love Series, Charcoal, Acrylic on Canvas, Red, Orange, Brown "In Stock" (2024)

FAQs

How do you seal charcoal on acrylic? ›

Rather than use a brush-on varnish (which would smear the charcoal anyway), you should use a spray varnish such as Golden Archival Spray Varnish or Lascaux UV Protect.

Start by mixing your colours on a palette or directly on your canvas. Then, use a brush to apply the paint to your surface. When working with acrylics, you can build up layers of colour to create different effects. You can also add mediums to your colours to change the consistency and texture.

The best ways to seal an acrylic painting is to use an acrylic resin varnish, acrylic polymer varnish, clear sealer, or mod podge, depending on the surface you are painting on. To avoid confusion, the word varnish can be used to refer to a traditional, oil-based finish or a general term for any finish.

Will the pastels/charcoal/chalk adhere to the acrylic? I have done it. But you will need to add a binding agent that will fuse it to the under layer like a gel gloss medium. I will look to see if I have an example some where.

Canvas makes a fantastic surface for charcoal drawings. The grain of the canvas allows the charcoal to adhere very well. As you can see here all three types of charcoal that I have used are able to create excellent marks when applied to the canvas.

Charcoal is made from twigs of willow or vine that have been heated at a high temperature in an enclosed vessel without oxygen. This process yields a solid drawing stick that produces a black line when stroked across a sheet of paper, a prepared canvas, or a wall primed for fresco.

To fix a charcoal underdrawing, the artist would traditionally go over it with sepia or bistre ink. Or trace over the charcoal lines with lean oil paint like raw or burnt umber.

Priming is the process of creating a barrier between the canvas and the paint. It's typically done by applying layers of acrylic gesso, clear acrylic medium, or oil primer. Prepping your canvas makes it less absorbent, helps your paint sit better on the surface, and protects your canvas from natural corrosion.

When you use acrylics you can paint straight onto canvas, as they will not sink into the material like oils.

Basically.. infinite… as long as you let the underlayer really dry and do not make them absurdly smooth. You could in theory pile up layers.. letting the ones dry out before extending many others and end up with a full centimeter thick painting… it would be a huge slab of plastic….

Do you put top coat over acrylic? ›

I recommend using CND's Solar Oil because it penetrates and actually speeds the curing process of the acrylic. Then, after cleaning the nails to remove excess oil, I apply both a base coat and top coat.

Preventing your acrylic paintings from sticking together can quickly be done if you line them with glassine paper or some readily available greaseproof paper. These papers are smooth and easily removable if, by chance, they stick together.

The powdery nature of the charcoal makes it perfect for this purpose. You can simply blow off any excess charcoal and it won't bleed easily through thin layers of paint.

Oil-based paints don't mix with water-based paints like acrylics, and although watercolors are water-soluble, issues like pH differences can cause instabilities when mixed.

Charcoal works well with quite a few mediums, including watercolor, gouache, acrylics, conte, soft pastels (non-oil) and chalk, allowing you to use as little or as much as desired. One advantage of charcoal is that it can be easily removed.