10 Tips to Prepare for Plein Air Painting — Lorenzo Chavez (2024)

FAQs

10 Tips to Prepare for Plein Air Painting — Lorenzo Chavez? ›

If it's your first time, buy supplies just for that one event and make adjustments after your experience. Carefully pack and double check your usual plein air kit. Remember to bring an umbrella, hat, sun screen, bug spray, wet paint carriers. Create and practice quick framing.

If it's your first time, buy supplies just for that one event and make adjustments after your experience. Carefully pack and double check your usual plein air kit. Remember to bring an umbrella, hat, sun screen, bug spray, wet paint carriers. Create and practice quick framing.

Introduction to Plein Air Painting

When you're out in the open air, you want to be able to work quickly and easily, so it's best to have a small, portable set of supplies that you can take with you wherever you go. This includes a sketchbook, pencils, paints, brushes, and a palette.

Changing Light - The best times for beginner plein-air painters is (in my opinion) between 11am and 3pm. The sun is high in the sky and the light changes aren't as drastic. Morning and evening light is the most beautiful and dramatic, but changes very quickly and can be frustrating.

Plein air painting is the act of painting outside, and it came to prominence in the 18th Century, when paint makers began to manufacture tubes of oil paint. This facilitated a greater ease in taking painting gear outdoors in order to capture the ever changing light across the landscape.

Pencils are perhaps the most basic of plein air media — and some of the most versatile! Whether using plain graphite, charcoal pencils, or vibrant colored pencils, drawing pencils are capable of rendering all the detail of nature, as well as overarching impressions of its greatness.

Panels sizes 9x12, 11x14, or 12x16 inches will work well for plein air painting.

plein-air painting, in its strictest sense, the practice of painting landscape pictures out-of-doors; more loosely, the achievement of an intense impression of the open air (French: plein air) in a landscape painting.

How long does a plein air painting take? ›

Some plein air paintings can be finished on location – taking only a matter of hours, while others require us to return to the same spot for several days. Finishing, however, is not a requirement or necessarily the best practice for outdoor painting. Most professional artists don't even sell their plein air work.

You can also buy special clips called canvas carrier clips, which enable you to carry two facing canvases without piercing the edges. These options work well for one or two paintings, but if you have more, consider a wet canvas box. Guerilla Painter Handy Porter is one model that comes in several sizes.

There are seasons in which painting in the open air is not possible. So, if you want to become productive in those months, you can skip putting a lot of weight on plein air painting and get the job done inside your studio.

If you feel like a certain element of your reference is going to be tricky when you paint, working it out through a pencil sketch first might be helpful - even if its not the whole picture and just a section of it.

En plein air (pronounced [ɑ̃ plɛ. n‿ɛʁ]; French for 'outdoors'), or plein-air painting, is the act of painting outdoors. This method contrasts with studio painting or academic rules that might create a predetermined look.

En plein air is a French expression meaning “in the open air”, and refers to the act of painting outdoors with the artist's subject in full view. Plein air artists capture the spirit and essence of a landscape or subject by incorporating natural light, color and movement into their works.

Using a clean, Princeton Gesso Brush or Catalyst Wedge apply the gesso/primer directly to the stretched canvas in even strokes. Work from the top to the bottom of the canvas, in parallel strokes. And don't forget the edges! Let the first layer dry for a few hours before moving onto your second layer.