How to start oil painting: everything a beginner needs to know
Oil painting has a reputation for being the most difficult painting medium to learn — complex, slow, demanding, and expensive. Some of that reputation is deserved. Oil paint does behave differently from acrylics or watercolour, it does require a few additional materials, and it does demand a degree of patience that faster-drying mediums do not. But most of the fear surrounding oils is unfounded, and the rewards of the medium — its richness, its blendability, its depth of colour, and the extraordinary range of effects it makes possible — are available to beginners from very early on.
This guide covers everything you need to start oil painting: what to buy, how to set up, the fundamental rules that govern the medium, and the first techniques to learn. It is written for complete beginners and for painters coming from other mediums who want to understand what makes oils different.
What makes oil paint different from acrylics or watercolour?
The defining characteristic of oil paint — and the thing that shapes almost everything else about working with it — is drying time. Oil paint dries slowly. Very slowly. A thin layer may take one to three days to be touch-dry; a thick impasto passage can take weeks. For painters coming from acrylics, where layers can be ready to work over in minutes, this is the single biggest adjustment.
But drying time is also oil paint's greatest gift. Because the paint stays wet and workable for hours, blending is effortless in a way that is simply impossible with faster-drying mediums. Colours can be pushed, mixed, and worked on the canvas itself. Edges can be softened. Changes can be made. The painting remains alive and adjustable for long enough that decisions do not have to be irreversible.
Oil paint is also more opaque and more richly coloured than most watercolours, and more naturally blendable than acrylics. The pigments suspended in linseed or other drying oils produce a depth and luminosity that has made oil the dominant medium of Western painting for five centuries.
The other key difference is that oil paint cannot be thinned with water. The oil binder repels water. Instead, solvents (to thin paint and clean brushes) and oils or mediums (to adjust consistency and drying time) are used. This is the most important practical thing to understand before you buy anything.
What you need to get started
Paint
You need fewer colours than most beginners think. A starter palette of six to eight colours is more than enough to paint almost anything, and starting with a limited palette forces you to learn mixing — one of the most important skills in oil painting.
A good beginner palette: Titanium White (buy a larger tube — you will use a great deal of it), Yellow Ochre, Cadmium Yellow or a Hue equivalent, Burnt Sienna, Cadmium Red or a Red Hue, Alizarin Crimson, French Ultramarine, and Ivory Black. From those eight colours you can mix a remarkably wide range.
We stock Wallace Seymour oil paints in 40ml tubes at Craft and Canvas — Series 1 and 2 from £9.95, Series 3 and above from £16.20. These are hand-ground artist grade oils of exceptional quality, made in Settle in the Yorkshire Dales. They are not the only place to start, but they are an outstanding one. For painters who want to begin with a more accessible option while they find their feet, we can advise on what else we stock in store.
Surfaces
Oil paint can be applied to canvas, canvas board, wood panel, or paper — provided the surface is properly primed. Most commercially available canvases and canvas boards come pre-primed with gesso and are ready to paint on straight away.
For beginners, Seawhite canvas boards are an excellent and affordable starting point — rigid, pre-primed, and available in a range of sizes from £1.35. They are more practical than stretched canvas for early work because they are inexpensive enough to use freely for practice without pressure. A few canvas boards alongside one or two stretched canvases gives you the best of both.
Brushes
Hog hair brushes — natural bristle — are the traditional choice for oil painting. The stiff bristles move heavy oil paint confidently and leave attractive brushwork visible in the dried surface. Pro Arte Bristlene synthetic hog brushes are an excellent vegan alternative that performs comparably. A small selection of rounds, flats, and filberts in sizes 4 to 10 covers most of what a beginner needs.
Soft synthetic brushes are useful for blending, for fine detail, and for glazing techniques using more fluid paint.
Solvents and mediums
This is where oil painting feels most different from other mediums, and it is worth understanding clearly.
Solvents are used to thin paint (particularly for early, lean layers) and to clean brushes. Traditional turpentine is effective but has strong fumes and requires good ventilation. Low-odour mineral spirit or Zest-It is a more practical option for home studios — it performs similarly to turpentine with significantly less odour.
Oils and mediums are used to modify the paint itself — adjusting consistency, drying time, and finish. Linseed oil is the most versatile and traditional medium, slowing drying time and improving flow. Alkyd mediums (such as Liquin) speed up drying significantly — a very useful property for beginners who find the slow drying of straight oil paint frustrating. Wallace Seymour Fast Drying Oil Glaze Medium is an excellent option that adds depth and gloss while bringing drying times into balance across the palette.
We stock Wallace Seymour oil mediums at Craft and Canvas alongside the paint range.
Palette
A flat, non-porous palette — glass, melamine, or a tear-off disposable paper palette — for mixing colours. Unlike watercolour or acrylic palettes, oil paint does not need to be kept moist between sessions. Simply cover the palette with cling film to keep unused paint workable overnight.
Rags and brush care
Keep a supply of lint-free rags or kitchen roll for wiping brushes between colours and removing excess paint. At the end of each session, wipe as much paint as possible from brushes with a rag before cleaning with solvent, then wash with soap and warm water. Never leave brushes resting in solvent — this damages the bristles and the ferrule.
The fundamental rule: fat over lean
The most important technical rule in oil painting is fat over lean. It refers to the oil content of each paint layer relative to the one beneath it.
Lean paint is paint thinned with solvent — it has less oil, dries faster, and is less flexible when dry. Fat paint has more oil — it is richer, slower to dry, and remains slightly more flexible.
The rule is that each successive layer should be at least as fat as the layer beneath it — ideally slightly fatter. If you apply a lean layer over a fat one, the lean layer dries first and can crack as the fat layer beneath continues to cure and move.
In practice this means: first layers should be thin and lean (paint thinned with a little solvent, minimal added medium); later layers can be richer, with more medium or straight paint from the tube; final glazing and finishing layers can be mixed with additional oil or medium.
Most beginners do not need to think about this obsessively — keeping early layers thin and later layers richer is sufficient. But understanding the principle explains why some oil paintings crack over time and others last for centuries.
Starting a painting: the underpainting
Most oil painters begin with an underpainting — a monochrome or limited colour first layer that maps out the tones and composition before full colour is developed on top. This approach has been used since the Renaissance and remains one of the most effective ways to approach a painting.
The simplest underpainting uses a single earth colour — Raw Umber or Burnt Sienna — thinned heavily with solvent to a wash consistency, and brushed in loosely to indicate the dark areas of the composition. Because the solvent evaporates quickly, this layer can be touch-dry within a few hours, ready to paint over the same day.
Working from a tonal underpainting gives you two significant advantages: it eliminates the intimidating white canvas and gives you something to respond to from the very first mark, and it means you are solving tonal problems (light and dark) separately from colour problems — which dramatically reduces the complexity of the painting process.
Basic techniques to start with
Blocking in — covering the canvas broadly with approximate colour masses to establish the overall composition before refining. Use large brushes and thinned paint. Do not attempt detail at this stage.
Wet into wet — the defining technique of alla prima painting, where fresh paint is worked into wet paint already on the canvas. Colours blend naturally at their edges, producing soft, atmospheric transitions. The key is confidence — too many strokes in the same area causes muddiness.
Scumbling — dragging a brush loaded with relatively dry, opaque paint lightly across a dried layer beneath. The upper colour catches the raised texture of the brushwork below, creating broken, luminous effects. Very useful for light effects, foliage, and atmospheric passages.
Glazing — applying a thin, transparent layer of paint mixed with medium over a dried layer. The colour beneath shows through, and the optical mix of the two layers produces a richness and depth impossible to achieve by mixing the same colours on the palette. One of oil paint's most distinctive qualities.
Ventilation and workspace
Oil paints themselves are generally non-toxic, but solvents require ventilation. Work in a room with a window open, or use low-odour alternatives to traditional turpentine. Linseed oil-soaked rags can be a fire hazard if left crumpled — spread them flat to dry or dispose of them safely.
You do not need a dedicated studio. A table near a window with enough space for your palette, paints, and a canvas is perfectly sufficient. Good natural light is helpful for assessing colour accurately — if working under artificial light, a daylight-balanced bulb is a worthwhile investment.
Frequently asked questions about starting oil painting
Do I need to use turpentine? No. Turpentine is traditional but has strong fumes and requires good ventilation. Low-odour mineral spirit or Zest-It perform similarly and are much more practical for home studios. Some painters work with oil alone as their medium and avoid solvents entirely, cleaning brushes with oil and then soap and water.
How long does oil paint take to dry? Thin layers can be touch-dry in one to three days. Thicker passages take longer — sometimes a week or more. The addition of an alkyd medium significantly speeds drying. Wallace Seymour oils contain no added driers, so drying times follow the natural characteristics of each pigment — earth colours and cadmiums dry faster, blacks and some blues more slowly.
Can I paint over a layer that is not fully dry? Yes — this is normal oil painting practice. You can paint into still-wet paint (wet into wet) or wait for a layer to become touch-dry before adding the next. What you should avoid is applying a lean layer over a very fat wet layer, which can lead to cracking as the layers cure at different rates.
Is oil painting suitable for beginners? Very much so. The slow drying time that intimidates many beginners is actually an advantage — it allows more time to blend, adjust, and correct than any other paint medium. The additional materials (solvents, mediums) are a small learning curve but quickly become second nature.
What is the best surface for a beginner to start on? Canvas board is the most practical starting point — rigid, pre-primed, and affordable enough to use freely for practice. Seawhite canvas boards from £1.35 are what we recommend at Craft and Canvas for beginners getting started with oils.
Can I use the same brushes for oil and acrylic? It is not ideal. Oil paint requires thorough cleaning with solvent, which can be hard on synthetic brushes designed for water-based mediums. Keeping separate brushes for oils and acrylics is a better approach. Hog hair or Bristlene synthetic brushes, cleaned promptly with solvent after each session, will last well used exclusively for oils.
Do I need to varnish a finished oil painting? Varnishing is recommended once the painting is fully cured — typically six months to a year after completion for a thickly painted work, sooner for thin paintings. Varnish protects the surface from dust and atmospheric pollutants and can be removed and replaced if the painting needs to be cleaned in future. A removable varnish is preferable for this reason.
Shop oil painting supplies at Craft and Canvas
We stock Wallace Seymour oil paints in 40ml tubes — Series 1 and 2 from £9.95, Series 3 and above from £16.20 — alongside Wallace Seymour oil mediums, Seawhite canvas boards and stretched canvases, Pro Arte Bristlene brushes, and everything else you need to get started with oils. Come into our Hebden Bridge shop or browse at craftandcanvas.co.uk.
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