Apr 262 min read

Froggie Island Vibes

Updated: Apr 28

For this froggie canvas, I wanted to play around with my palette knife some more, but I also wanted to do another realistic bit of seaside scenery. With the addition of another one of my favorite subjects, the flower, this painting was born!

Preparing the Canvas

Applied two coats of Liquitex brand white gesso. (not in video)
Used Washi tape to block out middle area for landscape detail.
Applied Golden brand ultramarine, Winsor and Newton cadmium red, cadmium yellow, and Liquitex brand chromium oxide.
Used my Liquitex Free Style #7 palette knife to scrape the paint across canvas.
Allowed paint to dry, then removed Washi tape from middle.

Drawing and Outlining

Outlined flower shape with black 0.7mm Posca marker.
Used 20/0 detail brush to paint ocean with ultramarine blue and craft brand teal.

Painting the Sky and Islands

Used pale teal tint for sky.
Painted tropical islands with chromium oxide, shaded with wash of Winsor and Newton mars black.

Adding Details

Outlined flower again with yellow 0.7mm Posca marker.
Drew tropical leaf outlines on frog's body with same marker.
Switched to white to draw in the clouds.
Used 20/0 Princeton Select Petite round detail brush to add shine to waves.

Adding Further Detail

Used blue and yellow 0.7mm Posca pens to add more detail to colorful abstract parts of frog's body.

Final Considerations on Varnishing

Would choose a spray-on semi-gloss varnish for final finish.