The Ready to Paint book series is designed for those who want to learn to paint but cannot rely on their drawing skills. Re-usable A3 (42 x 29.5cm; 16½ x 11¾in) outlines of paintings are provided to pull out from the centre of the book. Clear instructions and step-by-step photographs show how to transfer the outlines onto paper and then how to create beautiful watercolour, acrylic or oil paintings, although the tracings could of course be used as the starting point for painting in any media.

Use this voucher code: READY at the checkout to get the special offer. Offer valid until January 12th.
Click here to go to the Ready to Paint books on the Jackson’s website.

This book series has been very popular- it shows just how many people want to get right to the fun part and enjoy the pleasure of the paint while skipping past the drawing step which for many people is the frustrating bit. This new concept bridges the gap between painting by numbers and conventional art instruction books.

Ready to Paint Books

Presented by well known art teachers the selection is growing fast and more titles are scheduled. At Jackson’s we stock all 31 titles in the series so far.

Click on the links above to go to the items on the Jackson’s website.

As always all books from Jackson’s come with a free sable brush.

Postage on orders shipped standard to mainland UK addresses is free for orders of £39.

Winsor & Newton Artists' Oil Colour

Winsor & Newton Winton Student Oil Colour

Winsor & Newton Artisan Water Mixable Oil Colour

Winsor & Newton Griffin Alkyd Fast Drying Oil Colour

Click on the links above to go to the offers on the Jackson’s website.

On offer at 20% off our regular low prices until January 12th.

20% off Jackson's Black Hog Brushes

Click on the link above to go to the offer on the Jackson’s website.

Tip for sketchbooks: if outdoors use an elastic band, paperclip or similar to stop pages flapping in the breeze.

To get straight lines in paint try brushruling. Steady a ruler with one long side on the surface and one tilted up in the air with your fingers curled under it. Run your paintbrush ferrule along the edge.

Shadows do not have to be plain grey. Try chromatic greys in complimentary colours to the object. A lemon could have a violet-grey shadow.

If you find your work too fiddly and tight then as you progress through the painting from large brushes to smaller brushes, try staying with the large brushes for longer and only using the smallest brushes at the very last.

Drying oils are the binders used when making oil paint. These include linseed (flax), safflower, poppy and walnut oils. They are also the ingredients used when making painting mediums to add to the paint to adjust its qualities. Mediums are usually made from a drying oil and either a resin (like damar) or a solvent (like turpentine).

The various drying oils have different drying times and properties. Mixing them with oil paint modifies the characteristics of the paint. They can make it thinner, lengthen or shorten the drying time, make it more transparent or opaque and change the gloss. Some oils and mediums cause yellowing but dry faster and others do not affect the colour but dry more slowly. You need to make choices about the qualities most important to you. For instance you might want to be sure to use a non-yellowing oil with white paint even if it means you must wait a longer time for it to dry.

The principle of painting ‘fat over lean’ must not be forgotten as any partially dry layers that are being painted over will continue to dry and shrink and may affect the layers on top. By insuring that later, upper layers dry more slowly than earlier, lower layers the paint will not crack or separate. If the layer has more oil it will dry more slowly and be more flexible so you are assured of a stable structure.

Types of drying oils:
Cold Pressed Linseed Oil (Unrefined):
Pale yellow in colour, increases gloss and transparency. Reduces brush marks. Produces a flexible film. Dries relatively fast. May yellow over time so many artists and paint manufacturers avoid using it with whites. The traditional oil to use.
Refined Linseed Oil:
Hot (steam) pressed oil, alkali-refined for artists’ use. This pale coloured oil increases gloss and transparency and slows drying time.
Stand Linseed Oil:
Oil heated until it changes at the molecular level. Heavy and thick it may need to be thinned with solvents. It is lighter in colour and yellows less with age than other oils. Dries to a smooth, elastic, enamel-like finish not showing brush strokes. Slow drying.
Poppy Oil and Safflower Oil:
Natural pale or colourless oil that yellows less than linseed oils so good for making white paint and mixing with whites. Dries more slowly than linseed oil. Weaker film than linseed oils which can promote cracking with aging, so less useful for the lower layers of a painting.
Walnut Oil:
Non-yellowing and dries a little faster than safflower and poppyseed oils. Glossy, and hard-wearing over time. Adds vibrancy, fluidity and resistance to cracking and yellowing.

All seed and nut oils will go rancid (oxidise) when exposed to air. This is part of the natural drying/curing process of the paint. But when in the bottle they can spoil. So like nut oils for use in the kitchen you will want to keep them cool, in the dark and in small, fully-filled bottles so less air is inside the bottle, and don’t buy too much in advance.

Oil painting mediums on the Jackson’s Art website.

Read more here about the history of these excellent handmade paints.

We now stock the Williamsburg colours at Jackson’s Art Supplies. We are pleased to offer an introductory discount of up to 25% off RRP until the 21st of October.

Williamsburg Handmade Oil Colours

Available in 145 special colours in tubes of 37ml + three whites and ultramarine blue in 150ml.

Williamsburg’s paintmaking philosophy:
“Getting the proper pigment is just the beginning. So much of the quality of oil paint is in the grinding. Each color is ground to enhance the beauty and luminosity specific to that particular pigment. Some colors will feel slightly gritty; others extremely smooth. Our Cerulean Blue will have a beautiful velvet, light-absorbing surface with an extremely strong covering power; our Siennas will often be chunky or gritty to allow light to travel through the vehicle, exposing rich golden or mahogany undertones instead of just heavy, dull browns.”
Most Williamsburg Oil Colours are considered to have excellent lightfastness (LF I), with the exception of Alizarin Crimson and Van Dyke Brown which have very poor lightfastness (LFIII).

Williamsburg Handmade Oil Colours

Rembrandt Watercolours

Rembrandt is a superb make of artists materials from Royal Talens in Holland. Their Rembrandt Oil Colours are very fine quality with high pigment concentrations in a range of 120 colours. Rembrandt Artists Soft Pastels are the world’s best selling soft pastels with a choice of 203 colours. Rembrandt Professional Watercolours are renowned for their transparency and quality and are available in 80 colours.

Jackson’s are offering Rembrandt oil colours, soft pastels and watercolours at 20% off our regular discounted price until October 4th.

Rembrandt Oil Colour

Linseed oil produces a strong film but does yellow somewhat in time. It is durable enough to be used in the under layers of a painting. Safflower oil (some brands use poppy or another non-yellowing drying oil) produces a less durable film so it shouldn’t be used for the lower layers, but shows virtually no yellowing, so it is great for the final phase of the painting where the yellowing matters most anyway.

Zinc white is semi-transparent, so you can lighten a transparent colour without making it completely opaque.  Titanium white is opaque so has good coverage and a few drops added to a transparent colour will make it opaque without lightening it very much.  (There have been rumours that zinc white is brittle so prone to cracking, but this isn’t clear.)

Many oil painters have all four whites in their paintbox as well as a lead white.

Canvas must be sealed (sized) from oil paint to prevent rotting. You can use rabbit skin glue or acrylic medium to seal the surface. Then you can apply one or more layers of primer or ground.
This can be oil primer, acrylic primer or any of the gessos depending on the texture of the surface you require for painting and the paint you will be using.
Acrylic primer (sometimes called acrylic gesso) will do both jobs at once- sealing (sizing) and providing a ground.

Paper must be primed as well before you paint oil colour on it. This is both to protect the surface from oxidizing (slowly rotting) because of the oil and to ensure a stable paint film because the paper would soak the oil out of the paint (it leaves a ring of oil) and there wouldn’t be enough binder left in the paint to form a stable film. Most artists apply 2 or more thin coats of primer. If the paper is thick enough (300gsm or greater) you can probably do just one side; if it is more lightweight than that it is best to apply it to both sides of the paper as the first side will curl and doing the second side after the first has dried will flatten it back out.

Primers on the Jackson’s Art Supplies website.

priming canvas