Course of Water Mixable Oil Paints for Beginners (10:00 - 17:00), 1900 CZK

Water-mixable oil colors and more!

If you love "painting with oils" - the technique of repeated application of paint through layering and glazing, you will be excited about this fantastic line of water mixable oil colors. These water soluble oil colors are quite similar to traditional oil colors, but they also have number of advantages that make us fall in love with them. For example, turpentine or other paint thinners are no longer needed - you can use water instead. In this way you can work without hazardous solvents, which is not only better for your health, but it also keeps your working space free of that unpleasant odor. It is thus possible to paint not only outdoors or in the studio, but you are offered the freedom to paint even in your living room.

Water mixable oil colors give to artist complete freedom to create. You only need brushes, artist palette, canvas and a head full of inspiration and ideas. Painting process is the same as if painted with traditional oil paints. They can be applied using traditional oil painting techniques without having to surrender any quality. These oil paints will dry the same, with colors unchanged and with all their gloss and depth. You only wash them better off your hands, table or floor, for no turpentine or other “smelly” solvents are required.

What are the benefits of painting with water-based oil paints?

• the highest degree of lightfastness and a wide variety of pigments
• you can paint anywhere you want (it does not smell)
• usual time of drying is the same as with traditional oil colors
• achieves a typical appearance of oil painting
• can be used for all oil painting techniques - painting Alla prima (wet-into-wet painting) - Layered painting - Glazing - Impasto painting
• you can paint with brushes, palette knives, sponges
• care and cleaning of brushes – only water and a little soap needed

You may be troubling yourself with the thought of missing your favorite painting media, but there's no need to worry.  Paint manufacturers had already thought about it and created a whole series of additives and mediums that can be used with water soluble paints: slow dry oil media, media for glazing and gloss, modeling paste texture media, final and protective lacquers.

Slow drying oil medium is used when you need a finer, more "oily" color and the paint longer to dry. Adding slow drying medium to the paint will double the drying time, allowing you to make further interventions to the painting. This oil medium is made from natural oil, resin and water.

Another useful additive (though not a necessity) is called glazing medium. Glazing medium improves the gloss and flow of the paint and produces a flexible but tough film that is superior in resisting yellowing and cracking with age. This medium is very "oily" and therefore, according to the principles of traditional oil painting, is used only in the upper layers of the painting. Although it's foundation is natural oil, this medium can be also mixed with water.

Painting paste, which you might know from acrylic painting technique, is one of the other interesting painting mediums (Cobra painting paste). This medium is colorless, water mixable and can be mixed with the paint in any proportion. The thickness is the same as that of the paint, and so the paste can be described as a water mixable oil paint without pigment. Cobra painting paste has various applications. It is particularly used in "impasto" painting technique. So for the Impasto technique of more expensive colors more paint can be made without any change in the color and you can paint freely in heavier layers.

Final coating is used as the final coat of varnish over the paint layers to provide the saturation of colors and to protect the painting from dust, dirt, and aging. Final coating gives depth and brilliance to the painting and it also provides surface protection from abrasion, yellowing and cracking. At the same time it can be removed even after many years, if there is any reason for it to be removed.

Painting with oil paints - step by step for beginners:

First you squeeze out selected amount of colors out of tubes (basic pallet can consist of these pigments - titanium white, primary yellow, permanent yellow medium, pyrrole red, primary magenta, ultramarine, primary cyan, yellow ocher, burnt umber).

Usually colors are laid out around the edges of the palette, leaving plenty of space in the centre area for mixing colors. Now, you can start painting. For those of you accustomed to sketching your artwork first onto a canvas, you reach for a pencil or charcoal. Those of you who are painting on a canvas right away, take a paintbrush in your hand. If you prefer the watercolor type of underpainting, dilution can be achieved simply by mixing colors with water on the palette or mixing your colors directly on the surface of the painting. This thinner layer usually dries faster than next layers of paint with less water used. Once is your underpainting dry, you can continue to paint over it.

As paints are diluted with water or white pigment, their lightness increases, ...with it you do not have to worry about, after drying (evaporation of water) once again deepen their tone and gain back its original appearance.

Various techniques of painting with water mixable oils:

"Alla Prima"- means that the painting is painted 'wet-into-wet'. In this technique layers of wet paint are applied to previously administered layers of wet paint. This technique requires a fast way of working, because the work has to be finished before the first layers have dried. Painting alla prima also has the added benefit of allowing you to mix your paint directly on the canvas as well as on the palette. You can apply pure paint to the canvas or mix it with the same thinner as you're used to. If you want to paint in very thick layers, you paint – "impasto". The impasto technique allows reliefs to be incorporated in the paint layers whereby the paint is applied on to the surface either undiluted or very thickly, usually thickly enough that the brush or painting-knife strokes are visible. Often are used palette knives instead of paint brushes.

"Layered painting"- with layered painting you build up the painting from various layers based on the traditional manner of classic oil painting (imprimitura, underpainting, painting, glazing and final layer). A next layer can only be applied once the previous layer is dry enough to ensure that it will definitely not dissolve. With a layered painting a technique is followed that is known as 'fat over lean'. Every subsequent layer must contain more oil. This means, that the first layer must be applied lean. For this the paint is thinned with water (as with classical oil painting with turpentine) and following layers are either undiluted or mixed with more oil media (slow drying). The more oil the paint layer contains the more elastic it will be once dry. The fat over lean principle can therefore also be interpreted as 'flexible over less flexible'. This clarifies why a layer of paint must be sufficiently dry before the next layer can be applied. A layer that is not sufficiently dry throughout is often too elastic for the subsequent layer, with again possible cracking as a result. If we keep the principle "fat over lean" or "flexible over less flexible" our images will properly get dry and age.

Proper image layers should look like this:

• final varnish (applied after 6-12 months after the painting is finished and completely dry)
• paint diluted with slow drying medium  (with more media)
• paint diluted with slow drying medium  (with a little media)
• undiluted paint
• paint diluted with lots of water (contain less oil)
• ground for painting (primed canvas, boards...)

So let's start with painting! What tools will you need for water mixable oil painting?

• an artist palette upon which you squeeze out and mix the paint
• brushes or painting knives, sponges...
• an appropriate ground for painting
• glass of water to thin the paint and glass of water for washing the brushes
• old piece of fabric or paper towel to clean the brushes
• painting media (slow-drying, glazing...)

And now we wish you lots of inspiration for creating your paintings! If you have any questions, please contact us, we will help you!

What are Cobra water mixable oil colors actually?

Cobra is a genuine oil paint. The paint is made on the basis of drying oils and does not contain any water. An unusual property of this oil, however, is that it can be mixed with water. The paint can be used in all the usual oil paint techniques. Very high-quality pigments are used for this product range. All the colors, which are up to 70, have the highest degree of lightfastness +++ (at least 100 years lightfast under museum conditions). Cobra oil colors carry the label of an Artist quality. It is pleasant working with Cobra water mixable oil colors as you do not have to use any white spirit. Brushes and palette knives can be cleaned simply using soap and water, which is an incredible advantage.

How is it possible that there can be oil colors, mixable with water?

To allow oil pigment and water to mix, a special emulsifier is needed. This additive helps to form a stable blend of small oil droplets in water. This blend is called an emulsion, which is water-soluble. Similar techniques have been used for a long time. Before oil paint even existed artists worked with casein tempera and egg tempera painting. These two types of paints use natural emulsifiers that are water-soluble but at the same time waterproof after drying.

What are the main advantages of painting with water-mixable oils?

The benefits of using water mixable oils are countless:

• easy to use - with Cobra oil colors you use water instead of the harmful solvents
• turpentine is no longer needed, so in this way is your working space kept free of that unpleasant odor of solvents and you can paint in the studio, outside - everywhere
• color retains its full expression after the paint has dried
• all color shades have the same degree of gloss
• the highest degree of lightfastness (+++ = at least 100 years lightfast under museum conditions)
• brushes and palette knives can be cleaned simply using soap and water