How to Dry Brush With Acrylic Paints on Wood
Dry brush painting is a technique that consists of loading a dry paint brush with paint and applying it to a surface, giving your work surface a scratchy appearance with lines, as opposed to a smooth washed look. Dry brushing can be used with oil paints or water-based acrylics. This technique can be applied to canvas or on the walls of your home. Dry brushing is easy to accomplish, fun to do and can give your art a creative final appearance.
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Instructions
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Load your brush with paint. The stiffer the bristles are on the brush, the better your dry brush technique will be. Make sure you load the brush with thick paint.
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Use a paper towel to squeeze the moisture from the paint. This will leave only a marginal amount of paint on the brush.
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Use a piece of scrap paper to make sure the paint comes off the brush the way you want it to.
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Apply the paint to your work surface in long strokes, running the brush over the surface until all the paint leaves the brush. Repeat this step again, leaving off where the paint begins to thin on your work surface. You can keep the brush strokes in one direction or vary each stroke for effect.
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Let the initial coat of paint dry before you try to apply a second coat. This is all there is to dry brushing. The effect you get will have a scratched, broken appearance. You should see a variation of lighter and darker lines running through it as well.
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Tips & Warnings
You can use several different colors over one another to give your work surface a new spin. Be sure to test the colors overlapping on scrap paper before you apply them to your work surface.
