In the past, we talked about, how to paint mountains. Mountains are the biggest topic for any wet-on-wet landscape painter and many people to teach it. But we get thousands of emails every day, people asking for help. We wonder why they have these problems and we get the main reason from asking questions back. The biggest problem we have found is the medium they use. You may ask. why does the medium matter? your medium is the foundation of your painting and at that point controls everything. If your house was built on a weak foundation, your house would have never been finished!  So what medium should I use? you need to stay away from pigment mediums that are "solvent" free. Solvent free means it's just oil and pigment. To make the medium fluid it needs a lot of oil. This creates a slick surface that will make it next to impossible to break paint. Such as highlighting mountains, rocks, adding clouds and highlighting foliage. Because your foundation is slick, you will make mud!! Brandon developed his signature pigment mediums ( Amazing White and Amazing Black) He discovered the secrets of what makes a premium medium! and the art companies today who are run by marketers will never discover the secret because they are not a true artist. Years ago the mediums on the market worked great! but something happened.  Marketers have seen that folks want NON-TOXIC products and oil painting is full of toxic products. So what does the marketer do? they just add more oil and remove the solvent. BINGO! why didn't the artist back in the 70's think of that, when he created the original pigment medium? because it will NOT work for this technique, It's too slick!  OK don't get us wrong non-toxic products are great and if it can be made non-toxic we will find a way to do it. And we did! our pigment mediums are made Non-Toxic and have been since 2015 when Brandon first developed his products. Yes, it's not eatable because of the solvent we use. But the solvent is non-toxic for the use. Meaning the fumes will not hurt you. Our solvent is natural and environmentally friendly and work like a charm! So when they claim that our mediums are a clone or knock off! let us be clear our mediums has been on the market long before theirs. They just put a name on the container that has been around for years. Don't let the name fool you! If you are tired of your paint not breaking switch to our mediums! click here if you found this information to be helpful click like, share so others can get the right info and leave a comment. :) 

We get this question often. How do you paint a rainbow?  Rainbows are probably one of the more easy things you can add to a painting to take an average painting and make it pop! so here is all you need to do. Let the painting dry, once the painting is dry you can add in your rainbow. The only tool you need is a fan brush. You can find high quality fan brushes here: http://brandonthomasartsupply.com/Brushes-_c_1.html  next the colors you need are Prussian blue, Hansa or Cadmium Yellow light and Naphthol  red or Cadmium red medium. Start by adding a tiny amount of yellow to your fan brush (just stain the bristles) and the dry brush your ark in. Rainbows are translucent menaing you can see through them. So dry brushing you will be able to see the texture and colors behind the rainbow. once you add the yellow go to the red, then the blue. And that's all it is! easy as clicking like at the bottom of this post :) if you liked this tip please share it with your friends! also here is a video on how to paint a rainbow. 

Have you ever wanted to learn the basics of color mixing? starting with just the primary colors, Blue, Red and Yellow? Some folks think primary color mixing is too hard to learn. But it is very easy! We've had thousands of folks contact us to start a primary colors art program, but we think this information should be FREE! so we are going to start an online painting program for FREE using the primary colors + white.  No need to signup for any membership or go through loopholes to get basic information! So here is what the program will cover! 
1. 5 paintings using the primary colors. 
2. Color mixing tutorial.   
3. Color charts.
4. Guide to what you need.
5.Getting started tutorial. 
6. Certificate of completion.  
The program will be available soon so keep an eye out! If you want more information about this program, make sure to like our Facebook page and signup for our email list. We hope you take up this awesome opportunity!  

​Many of our beloved students from around the world contact us every day about the different techniques, supplies and instructional materials. As you know here at Brandon Thomas Art we have a great library of videos, helpful tips along with many groups where you can find help and our professional artist materials. When folks have questions we usually send folks over to a one of Brandon's videos or Brandon will answer the question himself on the phone or email. Brandon wants everyone who contacts Brandon Thomas Art to get the right information and no jazz in the middle. Brandon is a professional artist, author, and instructor. Brandon has real information that will take anyone from beginner to a wet-on-wet painting master! Brandon and the Brandon Thomas Art team is fully committed to YOU even if you buy nothing from us! why? because we're here to teach YOU what YOU want to learn. We're not here for the money and that's the biggest reason we are attacked daily from almost every company who sells wet-on-wet painting supplies because we're here for YOU not your wallet and that's what we've been doing since 2008 and that will never change! Now like we said we get thousands of students contacting us every day and unfortunately they have been bitten by the marketer monster!!! they call or write that "my mountains aren't breaking" "my painting is muddy" "my highlights won't stick" "why is my medium so oily" etc....... We get so many of these question. why? because the marketer monster is spreading wrong information along with designing supplies for people to use. Now that seems very odd, right? why is this person writing information and creating materials when he has no clue about the medium or the technique?  That's like going to the dentist who has no teeth! So why are people taking his information and running with it? that's because he works for a company who use to be very respected in the wet-on-wet painting world and they call him a master artist or...  he calls himself a master artist and at the same time tells these same folks that YouTube is the worst place to learn and YouTube artist will waste your time. Unfortunately for him, YouTube is the best place to learn and it cost you nothing! You get more information faster and from many different people and with one click of the mouse! You can learn to paint from thousands of different great artist or learn to cook, work on your car and so many other things from many people who have real world experience. So why would someone NOT go to YouTube and why would he say such nasty things about YouTube and painting shows on YouTube? because he wants you to spend thousands of dollars on his memberships, DVDs, and supplies. He could care less if you actually was able to paint a blue sky, he just wants your hard earned money. We warn folks to stay away from that negative marketer monster because he will bite and when he does you and your wallet will feel it! So join the millions of people getting the right information the first time without the negative drama of a marketer worrying about his next dollar! We hope you contact us today and start learning from a real artist!

Brandon Thomas Seascape Workshop 
 Hey everyone! today I want to talk about my workshop coming up on August 27th from 11 am - 4 pm this workshop is an advanced seascape workshop. In this workshop I will teach you how to take a simple foam pattern you already know and turn it into a more realistic foam pattern. I will also show you advanced techniques in laying in your waves and crashing on rocks. And how to layer your sky without making mud! This is an advanced class but anyone can join.  The supplies you will need are simple a 11 x 14 canvas . The reason I am using this size of canvas. Is so I can teach a more advanced painting in a shorter amount of time. This way you will learn more techniques without rushing to finish .  You will  also need a tabletop easel. I recommend a tabletop easel with a canvas mount on top. This way when you leave the workshop your painting wont get damaged in your travels back home.  All other supplies will be in the classroom for you to use! The workshop will be a great time and I can't wait to get back in the classroom and meet many of you! I hope you signup for the workshop I know you wont regret it!
- Brandon T!   

In the video above is a clip from my  latest episode of Painting With Magic. In the clip above I show how to create some simple background mountains (Appalachian mountains) This is a great way to add depth to any painting. Maybe your painting a barn or cabin painting. This would be a great add on to your background to give more depth and make it look more like its in the woods of the country side in Kentucky. Or maybe some large hills. This simple technique will give you more tricks up your sleeve when your creating your next masterpiece. So you can use a few tools.

Above are a few photos of the brushes I usually use when I'm creating background mountains. I also included the links so you can pick up the right brush for you! Loading the brushes are about the same way. You want to load them to a crunched brush if you want more texture, or a chiseled edge when you want more sharp angles. So if you want background mountains like in the clip above you want to tape the brush in the paint to give it texture ( crunched brush ) or to get sharp edges load it on both sides and pull through the paint to give it a chiseled edge and then pull it down to paint the trees.
I hope this little blog helped you create some easy background effects! Until the next time! god bless!
-Brandon T!

In today's blog, I want to go over a question I get a lot and that's how to paint simple snow. I took a clip from one of my shows showing how to paint the simple and easy way to lay down snow, so you can add trees on top or a cabin or tall grasses etc... First to get started you need to paint in a dark base that can be a dark blue or black. In the video clip I covered the whole canvas in Black Canvas Seal ©.
This gave me my dark base so I can show the nice white snow on top. Because you need dark to show light. Next I used my 1" Landscape brushes.  
Then I loaded it in Titanium White to a chiseled edge, and just pulled in my snow. This technique will give you a nice soft snow. If you want a textured snow use your palette knife and load a roll of paint on it and then break it on top of the dark base. 

In today's blog I want to go over creating simple ocean foam. Many struggle when it comes to seascapes,some say its the hardest to learn and I would agree. But with these simple steps I hope to make this easier for you!  When studying foam I noticed that it has pockets and it looks like a 3 so I started to paint my foam in a 3 shape and man what the difference. But I started to learn how to get a simple but realistic foam using just a filbert brush. So in the clip above I show just how easy it is. But I want to go over it a little more in the blog. You want to load your brush in a even mixture in 50% Titanium white and Amazing White © and loading the brush by pushing it in the paint and creating a roll of paint on the edge of the brush. And using that edge to create my simple foam by following the angle of the wave. moving up and down creating pockets. And keeping the 3 shape in mind. This simple little tip should help you with your foam.

Painting large clouds.
In today's blog I want to go over how to paint the easiest clouds when starting out. I get many questions everyday about how to paint cloud. So I thought I would start off with the easiest way first. In the video above is a clip where I show this easy method. All you need is a 2" Landscape brush. or a 1" Landscape  brush.  And use one corner to tap into some Titanium White. Remember when painting leaf trees blog? when we just tapped the brush into the paint and could see all the little bushes in the paint on the palette? This is the same technique! After loading your brush go tot he canvas and think of a basic cloud shape. And then just tap it on, using one corner. After painting your cloud take a clean 1" landscape brush and blend out the base, then fluff it up using a soft upward motion. You can use the Hake brush for this to make it really soft and its a lot easier to use.