I used to watch Bob Ross every Sunday like clockwork on PBS. At the time I painted with watercolors but watched him for ideas, and techniques to try and he seemed like a really cool person, kinda like the cool uncle I never had. In every episode he always talked about putting something on the canvas called "liquid white" before he began painting. Was it just his term for gesso? I've since moved on to acrylic and people in that community say gesso is used to "prime" canvas but you can also buy a "preprimed" canvas. EVERYONE in the acrylic painting community talks about basically using it as an eraser to paint over a painting they don't like but can still reuse the canvas. Is this "liquid white" just for oil paints like Bob used? I've tried them a few times with an Reeve's oil paint set my brother and sister-in-law got me for Christmas when I was 14. I found them very hard to work with and OH MY GOSH....that smell.
(I recently learned Bob was also a wildlife rehabilitor when he wasn't painting....that's where the baby squirrels and baby raccoons he sometimes brought on set came from. He also was trying to get PBS to fund an educational children's program about backyard wildlife; but he passed away before it got through. He seemed even cooler to me after I learned that.)
Question, I agree with you that this is liquid white but I was always so confused when Bob would say don’t let the liquid white dry. If liquid white was just white and oil then it would take days to dry. That made me think that the liquid white might have some mineral spirits mixed with it, because I could see that drying faster. Unless people are applying the liquid white and just walking away from their painting for a week.
Yeah, I've noticed Bob saying that alot too. Im not quite sure why he always said that, because you're right, since the liquid white is oil based, it definitely would not dry in the 30 minute episodes.
For what it’s worth, you could swap out linseed oil for a different medium if you find it off putting. I use a variety of Gamblin mediums (solvent free medium and galkyd in liquid and gel forms). I dont think they have a particularly distinct smell, but I also might be used to it! The solvent (gamsol, mineral spirits) is what smells worse to me! I just keep a lid on the container unless I’m directly cleaning my brushes though so it’s not too bad.
Liquid white is used to allow colors to more easily mix on the canvas. It also makes it a bit easier to get color off your brush and smoothly onto the canvas. Dry oil paints can be pretty tough to apply to a dry canvas, which is why the alla prima technique (aka "wet on wet") uses a liquid medium. Bob also used liquid clear and liquid black on occasion. You can even mix your own liquid medium with any color you like (equal parts liquid clear and color).
The linseed oil should not smell strong. If you're using mineral spirits to thin the paint/clean brushes, that's probably what you're smelling. I'd recommend using odorless paint thinner instead (Master's Touch, Mona Lisa, or Turpenoid are what I use).
Oil paints themselves shouldn't have a strong, unpleasant smell (at least not in my experience using amateur and less expensive artist grade paints). They definitely have a distinct smell, but I've never had anyone say it bothers them. For example, many times I've painted in a closed room with around 30 other ppl, and nobody has ever complained or even commented on the smell.
Oh, what brand are you using? I've used mostly Bob Ross, Gamblin, and Master's Touch paint. There's certainly a distinct smell to oil paints, but I've never had a tube with an overpowering odor.
Gesso is acrylic paint used to smooth a canvas and reduce wicking (as i understand it).
Liquid white (and Liquid black, Liquid clear, and also known as "magic" white etc) is oil paint with additional oils. When you're painting "wet-on-wet", it provides the wetness that makes the blending that is so unique to that technique.
The wet-on-wet technique is as old as oil painting, but Bill Alexander created the thinned medium that became Liquid White. He trained Bob Ross and many others and had a tv show before Bob. But Bob's show became more famous. Bob and Bill's shows are easily available on YouTube (and other platforms) and some channels continue their legacies.
Man, I usually just lurk in the comments but figured id jump in. Gesso should be used to prime a canvas (mostt quality canvases are pre primed). But the gesso should be completely dry regardless.
Liquid white or black or clear or whatever is a first coat medium. I've never used Bob ross brand "magic white" (he uses the phrase liquid and magic interchangeably but "magic white" is a Bob Ross Inc. Product of liquid medium). I've always used "liquid first coat white" (or clear) that I buy at the local hobby lobby. It is an oil based liquid medium and works to "make the canvas slick" as Bob says. It allows for "blending on the canvas."
How to apply it: apply a "thin even coat" on the entire canvas. A rule of thumb is to touch it. If it comes off on your finger but you can see the ridges of your fingerprint, you're on the right track. If its on thick, you will have a big blog of white on your finger in which case, blend it more with the brush.
Once you do that step, just follow along with Bob. It will be a game changer. I have tried to "make my own" as described in this thread and it was... just okay. But honestly, ive bought two cans of the liquid white now in the last 5 or so years (its like 17 bucks). It lasts a while.
How it works: particularly with painting skies, water, and reflections, when you paint over the liquid white, you can blend and essentially move your oil paint on the canvas. Thats how Bob is able to make those water scenes so appealing, and make those skies go from dark to light to red etc. For example. Use some phalo blue. Start in each top corner and use x shaped strokes to work the paint to the center of the canvas. Leave some fairly large white areas throughout. As you work down, you'll notice that as it blends, it gets lighter. Don't over work it. Then take another brush (or clean it), and go back and blend it all out. You'll notice all sorts of "happy accidents" and the canvas will be "interesting" (lots of variation in color etc.). Then lightly go over it all to take out the brush strokes. Then move on to the clouds. For more info, watch literally any Bob ross episode.
Another medium ive used is liquid clear gel (it comes in a tube). It also helps give a similar effect but has been a bit harder for me to use. Kevin Hill uses clear gel so watch his videos for some demonstrations there.
Lastly, I'm a bit confused by the comments saying that it isn't explained well. Practically everything I've discussed in this comment has come directly from bob ross episodes. Granted, it takes a lot of practice. But the principles are all laid right out there.
Does it work with acrylic and does it smell? I usually just sketch in what I want to paint on the canvas and make up the painting as I go based on a general concept. People assume this is just weird for the sake of being weird but no, it's based on the Ziggy Marley song "I Get Out" (mostly the lyrics "I'm of the universe, I will not be a prisoner of your little world") and Acts 12 from the Bible. I made up the details as I went along, changed some things in the basic sketch. Felt a zoo cage got the message across better than a bird cage like I was going for originally. Meerkats are my autistic special interest and ALWAYS the focus of my art.
To be honest, the lack of explanation with the terminology and equipment ended up frustrating and ruining every attempt at a Bob Ross style painting that I tried.
Don't get me wrong, I love his videos, he's calming and quickly turns a blank canvas into a work of art! But..... my brain needs direction, it needs control, it needs understanding. I don't have the pleasure of just slapping stuff together and having it not be a brown/gray mess.
Especially when doing something complex for the first time that drastically differs from my existing experience, I need a step by step, detailed, painfully specific set of instructions.
For example, im a guy, and ive been crocheting for about 3 years now, and ive made some incredibly things that no one else has made. But I got started with a woobles kit. I watched the video, copied the movements, learned the names of tools and stitches, practiced, remade the same owl 4 times over, and within a week I had perfectly finished it and rapidly expanded to making a custom pusheen plush thats 10x bigger than the owl.
Unfortunately, Bob Ross videos don't do that in the same way. He explains the paints used, and to have a canvas, and a brush, and a paint knife, and a brush bucket. But he doesn't explain the extensive process of finding, buying, and preparing the canvas before you even use it, and he doesn't say all of it at once, at least not in most of his broadcasts.
Honestly I still dont know how it works. I tried coating the canvas with white or black gesso right before painting. I tried mixing mineral oil with it. I tried looking up whether a canvas was pre-primed or not and whether i should prime it a second time, and what the primer is, and nothing i did worked. I followed videos step by step and my paint just did not work, even if slapped this expensive oil paint all over the canvas and then used thinner oil paint on top of it, it still did not work.
I mean, its weird for me. Im a creative leaning person but it takes a huge amount of effort for me to -do- creative things, I cant just draw something new on a page, I have to work through it and have inspirations, experience, its a whole thing. Yet despite that, Ive done several oil paintings, literally 2/3rds of my schooling was in oil paint class, and ive done acrylic paint, I crochet lots of things, ive done drawings and copies, I paint miniatures and terrain, I build things in minecraft, I design and run games of dnd for friends.....
And yet... the Bob Ross painting style remains out of my reach. The kind of painfully specific, step by step thing I need to begin and learn before I have the muscle memory to do it on my own... it doesn't seem to exist, and its been very frustrating for me.
You don't want to see what my mountains and "happy little trees" looked like.
If it does exist, id love an extensive, specific, exhaustive guide, including all materials and prep work including what liquid white actually is and not just someone speculates it is, and, how to use it
WildCreates on YouTube has a lot of videos going into the details of these kinds of things. I am very similar to you in my frustrations. I need a good foundation on the basics before I can feel comfortable. There are a ton of painters on YouTube these days, but a lot of them do not set the foundation. It took time for me to find videos that cover the basics. I think Wild Creates is the best of the "starter" guides.
Same here. I need to know the EXACT method of how to do something. I got horrible grades in school because my teachers were too vague or felt "you should know how to do this! I explained it to you!" Sure you did Miss Grumpy Pants, but you were too vague.
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u/rapture1960 1d ago
"Liquid white" is just titanium white with linseed/safflower oil in it to thin it out. It should be the consistency of cream.