Oil Painting - Use of glazes and the dreaded sheen

[Paul Kernan]

Wondering if anyone has a solution. I have generally painted wet on wet but recently experimented with glazes. The tonal effect was right but I was left with a distinct sheen, even after being left under a heat source. I used white spirits as the carrier. I was painting red so this may be part of the problem but is this normal and is there some way of avoiding it? I'm not a big fan of dullcote, etc but if I must, I must

Thanks
Paul

 

[Johan Kees]

Paul

Some oil colours are more prone to leave a sheen than others. Red is such a colour indeed, as is blue. A rule of thumb is never to use a colour out of the tube but always mix another colour with it. This should diminish any sheen already. In example: I always mix some Venetian red into cadmium red. This dulls down the colour a bit, but Venetian red tends to dry quite flat also.

I hope this helps.

Jhan

 

[kagemusha]

Hi Paul, this might help you http://www.planetfigure.com/threads/my-way-with-oils.52194/

Regards

Ron

 

[Paul Kernan]

Johan: Thanks, mate. I've been lucky with blue as generally ends up flat. Red on the other hand, as you said, is always a prob. That's why I mixed some Prussian Green into the Cadmium Red but still no luck.

Ron: Thanks for the link

Paul

 

[Gary D]

Hi Paul. To keep the shine down on my oils Carl Barton says to add a bit of Tamiya Flat Base X-21 to the oil mix. (It worked really well) I wonder if this would apply to your glazes as well? Maybe give it a try.

Gary

 

[Paul Kernan]

Thanks Gary. I've used Tamiya Flat on my occasional foray to the dark side (acrylics) but didn't think to use it with oils. I'll try it out a some scrap pieces to get the hang of it.
Cheers

Paul

 

[Blind Pew]

This is the perennial issue with oils. I almost always allow the paint to soak into some cardboard to let out the excess oils.

I also am a big exponent of the Fredericus Rex's malmittel. It works great with oils and really decreases the drying time as well.