Acrylics are easier to control on yupo paper, even diluted in water they will not “run as fast” as watercolor. When the paint doesn’t seem to stick enough to the paper I add a little bit of soap and that usually fixes the problem.

Soap will also help you get rid of greasy fingerprint marks that are repelling the water if you made some.

Here are a few pictures of my process, I used only acrylics, water and soap, no gel medium or alcohol.

• Acrylic
• Paper: yupo
• 14 x 11 inches

Step by step painting tutorial

I am painting this portrait from a picture. To reproduce my drawing on the paper I did draw squares on my printed picture and on my yupo paper to be more accurate with my drawing.

I am a Blick Art Materials affiliate and I receive a small compensation for sales. That does not effect in any way the cost of the purchaser’s order but it helps me keeping the content of this blog free.

Yupo Watercolor Paper Yupo is a compelling and unique alternative to traditional art papers. It’s a synthetic paper, machine-made in the USA of 100% polypropylene. It is waterproof, stain resistant, and extremely strong and durable. PH neutral.

This is the drawing I am going to work with. I erased the squares, although you can still see some faint trace on the paper, but this won’t be visible after I’m finished painting.

I am starting with a layer of orange because this color was present in most of the picture. I am still using the paint in a very diluted way for the underlaying colors.

I am paintings with colors, one at a time, placing them on the painting where I see them on the picture. The final colors will be a mix of all the colors I layered.

Here I am introducing some new colors, still working with very watery acrylic

I introduced some dark colors, like the black in the background and starts to work with thicker paint in some areas. I like the bright colors in the shades but will have to subdue some of it for the tones to be more accurate.

I am a Blick Art Materials affiliate and I receive a small compensation for sales. That does not effect in any way the cost of the purchaser’s order but it helps me keeping the content of this blog free.

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Amsterdam Expert Series Acrylic Sets The well-balanced sets are chosen from Amsterdam’s full range of 70 genuine artists’ colors, formulated with high concentrations of authentic, non-fading pigments. These heavy body paints are exceptionally durable and flexible due to their 100% acrylic resin formulation. – Expert Series Set of 12

This is the finished painting, I added paint until I was satisfied with the result.Because I was not trying to be hyper-realist on this painting I wanted to keep some bright colors accents in a few places,and also keep a lot of textures and patterns in the paint, but have the painting look coherent from a distance.