A Blog About Oil Painting
Welcome to my blog. Here you'll find me rambling on about all sorts of things related to art in general and oil painting in particular. There's even a recipe for dog cookies hidden away somewhere.
Like the rest of the site, this section is still a work in progress and I will be making it tider and easier to navigate in time. There is a lot of content, so using the buttons below may help you to get around. Newest posts are shown first.
A Cheap Alternative to Framing a Painting
by Simon Bland / 24 Oct 2017
Let's face it, whether you buy retail or wholesale, the cost of framing your artwork in advance of a show can leave a dent in your finances. In this blog post I show you a simple way to transform your painting panels so that they can be sold ready to hang....
A Simple Abstract Painting Technique
by Simon Bland / 07 Oct 2017
I struggle to create abstract paintings and I admire painters who can do it with what seems like little effort. I mean, how do you even conceptualize this stuff in the first place? In this blog post I explain an easy abstract painting technique....
Painting Animals in the Landscape
by Simon Bland / 30 Sep 2017
Throughout my painting career I've painted both animal and landscapes. Yet, combining the two has always been difficult. Over the summer I spent some time on a series of paintings with animals in them. In this blog post I talk about what I learned and my experiences in painting these pieces....
Three Alternative Ways to Paint a Green Background
by Simon Bland / 21 Sep 2017
In this blog post I present some options for handling the bright green backgrounds that often occur in reference photos of animals....
Use an Analogous Color Scheme for Black and White Subjects
by Simon Bland / 08 Sep 2017
Animals with black and white coloration are the hardest of all to paint. In this blog post I show some techniques for making them easier to handle....
Integrating the Subject of a Portrait with the Background
by Simon Bland / 04 Sep 2017
In this blog post I show some ways to make a portrait subject work better with a given background....
Brush Technique in Small Paintings
by Simon Bland / 29 Aug 2017
A discussion of my preferences for paint handling in portraiture and some techniques for better rendering of the features....
Winter Ferry Crossing - Light on the Water
by Simon Bland / 20 Jul 2017
Like many of my recent landscapes, this started out as something different, and was reworked several times. It was based on a photo taken during a ferry ride to Bremerton in January....
A Dog Portrait in Pencil
by Simon Bland / 30 Jun 2017
My wife gifted this to her boss's boss on his retirement. As it was done in secret I had to work from some fairly stinky photos, but I managed to piece them together just enough to get it done....