Brushes

[slaj]

What paint will you be using? try brush cleaners for cleaning

Stephen Mallia

 

[Einion]

The stiffening agent in new brushes is usually a starch glue, just bend the bristles over with your fingers a couple of times to powder it off.

Brush cleaning techniques depend on the type of paint, if you're going to be using acrylics always wet the brush before dipping it into the paint and rinse it out thoroughly and often during the painting process with clean water. This will prevent having to wash the brush as often, which is very wearing to the bristles.

The best brushes for detail work are Kolinsky 'sable' but they are quite expensive. Brand availability will depend on your location, Escoda might be easy for you to find. You can make do with synthetics until you are sure you want to continue (the golden-coloured nylon type is good) but they are much inferior in terms of their point for painting details; most of us use a few synthetics for tough jobs like drybrushing groundwork, saving our expensive brushes for the good stuff.

Einion

 

[daredevil]

I know this topic is old, but I was perusing the topics & figured at some point someone else would do the same.
Brushes are your best friend. Buy the most expensive you can afford and take care of them by:
1. Cleaning promptly after use.
2. Complete cleaning after your modeling session. Use a good brush cleaning soap, available at art supply stores. They deep clean and condition the bristles, leaving them soft and pliable for the next time you pick it up.
3. Lastly, DO NOT put a freshly cleaned and still wet brush upright--leave it lying flat. Otherwise, the bristles will eventually rot out at the ferrule (place were bristles attach to metal sheath).
Also, the person that started this topic mentioned that the bristles were "splitting"--this can come from roughing a delicate brush up too much, or perhaps a less expensive brush. You can try leaving some of the brush cleaning soap on the brush after cleaning, shape it to a tip with your fingers, and leave it to dry that way. It might help. I have picked up many brushes, thinking they looked fine with a nice little point--only to have the thing NEVER keep a tip while painting!
It's a battle sometimes, but if you find that "magic" brush, treat it well & it should give years of trusty service!
--daredevil

 

[PJ Deluhery]

After using them, I keep my brushes properly formed and pointed by cleaning them thoroughly and then dipping them in a small jar of women's hair conditioner. I form the bursh into a point (or whatever shape it is) with the conditioner on it and let it dry. The brush stays formed and the conditioner is good for the bristles. When I want to use the brush, I just run it gently over my finger and the conditioner falls out as a powder. This works with both sable or synthetic brushes, and can save a pretty badly splayed brush.

Happy painting!

 

[Einion]

Hi Linda, I advise against washing a Kolinsky brush every time it is used except perhaps for oil painters, this shortens the life of the bristles because friction is friction and Kolinsky hair doesn't like it much. With acrylic painters, particularly for detail brushes - 0000 to 1 - you can get away with frequent rising during painting and a really thorough rinse at the end of the session; using a double bath system with a couple of drops of dishwashing liquid in the water will help a lot too.

Spending a lot of money is unfortunately no guarantee of getting a top-class brush these days. Anyone who missed it do check my post in this thread.

Drying brushes upright does not rot the bristles. It may weaken the glue, which is perhaps where the myth arose since degraded glue will let go of the hairs, but these days because the glue used is almost always completely waterproof it probably never happens. And if you shake, tap or wick out most of the moisture before standing them up to dry, as you should, they're only damp really anyway. By all means lay your brushes to dry flat if you want, this can be useful for reshaping flats, but for rounds of the sizes we use they dry most efficiently upright.

Einion

 

[daredevil]

Einion --I'm curious: if you don't clean a brush after you use it, how do you keep it from getting gunked up overnight? That's quite a trick!
--daredevil

 

[Robin]

HI Linda

Think you missed the point Einion says that to rinse your brush in a two bath system. Enion told me this method a while ago and I use it all the time, the washing up liquid is a neat trick too. Keeps brushes nice and clean.

I only ever deep wash my oil bryushes and then only every so often, I do use shampoo though which seems to give them some bounce back. Head and shoulders to be precise

Robin

 

[KeithP]

Good advice from Robin and Einion. I used to wash my brushes with brush cleaner after every session. Totally degraded the Series 7 very quickly.

Now I only rinse in a couple cups of clean water for acrylic. And, clean thinner for oil based.

Also, keep seperate brushes for acrylic and oils...

Keith

 

[Einion]

Originally posted by Einion@Nov 28 2004, 07:16 PM
...a really thorough rinse at the end of the session...

As Robin said maybe you missed this bit?

It's washing I was specifically referring to. The recommended procedure for brush washing - soaping up in the palm of the hand, splaying the bristles and working up a lather - is ideally suited to hog bristle brushes (especially with oil paints where you want to remove every last trace of drying oil) but it's a killer for soft-hair brushes, particularly if you want rounds to keep a good point. It's worth doing every now and then but if your normal rinsing method is thorough washing is rarely necessary and doing it every single time you use a brush is a great way to cut a Kolinsky's lifespan to a fraction of what it would be otherwise.

Einion