Hi!
All I can say is practise, practise and again practise. When I paint I use many layers of
thin Oils. My paintings are never created with thick layers of paint on the canvas. When I painted my second step in the progress I always let the Painting to dry for one day to make it easier for me to apply the second layer with thin Oils and to create a nice light to it. I don’t like to use very much extra Oil when painting, especially not for dark or black colours. The white paint usually needs some extra Linseed Oil or something like it.
You can take a look on my work in progress pages to see how it’s done in 4-5 steps; let’s take my new Painting of a Border collie named Spot. It’s a Combination Portrait because he used to herd Sheep when he was alive.
This is the painting:
Take a look at my steps here with some explanations about how I’m painting it:
http://www.pet-art.net/work-in-progress3.htm
If you have any questions I will be glad to answer, only came up with a question because it’s hard to just write something down.
Katja