Types of Paint Explained

Every artist experiments with different media before they pick their favourite. I’ve experimented with pencils, pens, coloured pencils, watercolours, acrylics, gouache, markers, and pastels, to name a few. But when you’re buying paintings online or trying to get into art, it can be difficult to understand what each of these words mean. Here you’ll find a brief explanation of the three most popular types of paint.

Acrylic is one of my favourite media to paint with. It’s often used by beginners, but can be used to create more advanced pieces of artwork as well. It’s water-based, so it dries extremely fast. Many see this as an advantage, but it can make it difficult to produce smooth blends. Working in this medium can force an artist to develop new and different techniques to get around the fast drying time. If you’re buying an acrylic painting, try and find out the lightfastness of the paint used. The more lightfast it is, the more resistant it is to fading and the longer it'll last.

Below you can see a portrait painting I did in acrylic paint. The fast drying time was a difficult obstacle to get around, especially when painting large areas with a lot of blending, like the face.

Oil paint is often seen as a master’s tool. Personally, I haven’t worked much with oil paint, but I know it can be a hard medium to use. Unlike acrylic, oil paint can take days, weeks, or even months to dry. This presents its own set of problems, forcing the artist to map out the piece more carefully and plan out each section. It also requires more tools than other paints, from palette knives and special brushes to turpentine and linseed oil. With oils, you can add texture to your paintings too, as shown in the picture below. If you’re buying one of these paintings, make sure to ask if it’s on canvas or paper, and if the canvas was primed. If not, the oils could seep through the material and ruin the painting.

Watercolour is another type of paint often used by beginners. As the name suggests, it’s water-based. I find it to be very unforgiving because it’s translucent, making it hard to layer over mistakes. However, you can produce unique effects that would not be possible with other paints! Keep in mind that watercolours will usually require a thicker paper and softer brushes. Watercolour paintings usually have a very specific look to them. It’s crucial to make sure they’re done on watercolour paper! This is a very thick paper that’ll prevent warping and leaking.

Below you can see a watercolour painting I did a few years ago.

This was done with more vibrant colours, and the blue pigment was diluted to provide an interesting visual effect. It was done on Canson XL mixed media paper.

There are other common types of paint too, such as gouache and tempera. Before you pick the type of paint you want to dive into and explore, make sure you try out as many options as you can. You never know which one you’ll like best until you try all of them!

Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed this article. Remember, I release new ones every week. Before you go, don't forget to check out my shop!