Chosing the brush

Choosing the correct brush can be a tough job for many beginning artists, although once you get your head around it, it is very straightforward. To begin with, you need to understand how the different types of paint work in order to pick the perfect brush for that type of paint. Below are examples of paints, techniques used and brushes needed for them.

Brushes can vary from the different medias and shapes. Personally, I prefer the round brushes with pointy edges as they create the thin detailed marks on the painting without any rough, straight edges.

Watercolour:

My personal favorite, Watercolour is a type of paint based massively around water. There are watercolours presented in both tubes and pan. Personally I prefer the pan form a it does not waste any paint (unless i used some) and I am able to always keep and eye on the whole palette to come up with colour schemes in my head leading on to paper. 

As watercolour is based on water, soft bristled brushes are needed as hard bristled brushes will leave unwanted brush marks on the paper. These soft brushes made from animal hairs, in this case squirrel hairs, are the perfect set to create a smooth blending technique between the colours yet creating a beautiful, semi-transparent effect. Although synthetic brushes could be used as well which are fairly cheaper compared to the natural haired ones.

Brushes can be separated into two sections: round brushes and flat brushes. Both sets of brushes are used to create different effects. For example, round brushes can create smooth curves whereas flat brushes create strong and rough edges.

Acrylics/Gouache/Oil

As these three paints are similar in thickness, similar brushes can be used. Yet the consistency and effect of all the paints are totally different which is a whole different topic. The perfect brushes used for these paints would be hard bristled brushes due do the fact that these paints are quite thick, where soft brush will simply not pick up the right amount of paint needed. The most commonly used brush is size 4 as it is the medium sized brush. Brush sizes begin at 000 and go up to 30.

All brushes have to be cleaned regularly after every use in order to keep the brushes in a workable format. Although Oil paints are similar in thickness as the other two, it is very different in consistency requiring total different care for the brushes. As these are oil paints, water cannot be used to mix the colours. Instead a special solution or mineral spirits are used which are also used to clean the brushes. Only that solution can bu used otherwise the brushes would not be cleaned thoroughly causing brushes some serious damage.