We have a transition from warm through to cool in the clouds, and we also have a transition of warmer through to cooler in each individual cloud.
How To Paint The Sky With Acrylics: 3 Techniques
If you love painting but have no idea exactly how to paint the sky with acrylics, let me help! In this blog post I’m sharing three techniques for painting very different skies.
The sky can seem like a tricky thing to paint, but it doesn’t have to be. The weather, season and time of day play a massive part in the colours present.
If you’re trying to convey a particular type of weather or mood in a painting, the sky can make it or break it.
Bear in mind today’s post isn’t doesn’t really cover clouds. I’m intending to write a post in the near future about different techniques for painting clouds. (I’m thinking about those white fluffy ones, which aren’t actually that white when you really look at them!)
You’ll notice, though, that the method for painting a stormy sky incorporates a technique to create heavy, dark clouds.
I’m also not going to be too exact with which paint colours to use. I want you have a go at the painting techniques rather than getting hung up on using the “right” paint colours.
That way, if you don’t have a certain shade of blue, or you use craft paints that aren’t named the same as my paints, it really doesn’t matter.
So let’s take a look at how to paint the sky with acrylics.
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Clear and bright
This is the kind of bright blue sky you might see on a summer’s day, such as in this simple acrylic beach scene.
It’s super easy to paint with just some ultramarine (or any other blue that’s more red-toned than green-toned) and white.
- Working with a damp brush, mix a tiny bit of white with some blue
- Starting at the top of your page, paint long strokes across it. Keep the strokes as horizontal as possible
- As you work towards the horizon, make the blue more and more pale by adding increasing amounts of white. The blue at the horizon should be much paler than it is at the top of the page
This technique should give you a graduated sky. It’s not a problem if it’s a little streaky, as it’ll just look more realistic that way. Nature is very rarely “perfect”!
Driving rain
It’s deceptively easy to paint a sky filled with driving rain, and this is a very freeing technique to use.
This is a great one if you’re too impatient to thoroughly mix your paint colours, since we actually want it to be pretty streaky!
The only thing you need to watch is the angle of your brushstrokes. They should all stay roughly the same to give the effect of rain.
If you start off painting diagonally across the page, make sure all your strokes are diagonal to give the effect of heavy, blustery rain.
Greys and blues work really well for this technique, although I’d encourage you to play around with your colour combinations to create different effects.
All you need to do is pick up a little blue, some white, and a tiny bit of black and streak it across the page without mixing it first. Try not to paint over and over the same section because doing that will result in the colours mixing together.
Perspective
We’ve all seen the perspective drawings of some perfectly straight lines, like railway tracks, receding off into the distance.
If you haven’t seen this drawing, this is what it looks like. Basically the theory is that things in the distance are smaller and flatter, and as they come toward you, become larger.
On a flat plane, parallel lines will merge at the horizon. This point is called the vanishing point. Easy enough to to grasp when you are dealing with straight lines.
Slightly more complicated though, is perspective when it relates to skyscapes.
There are rarely straight lines in the sky, and clouds are rarely uniform in shape and pattern. Yes, yes, I know, there are exceptions. Of course, if your skyscape has no clouds, then a large part of this painting problem is solved!
The basic theory with this subject is that clouds close to the horizon will generally appear smaller. If there are any lines, or any loose patterns, they’ll be subject to the same rules of perspective that buildings and straight lines are. Here are some examples for you.
Your homework is, grab a glass of chardonnay (or beverage of choice), and sit on a hill. Watch the clouds. Take some notes. Really notice the difference between clouds that are far away from you, and close to you.
How does the distance affect their shape? Are there any patterns that are altered with distance? Do some quick sketches. Keep it simple.
The object of this exercise is just to observe the varying skyscapes around you, and make notes.
When you understand how to use perspective, your clouds and skyscapes will be more natural and will have wonderful depth.
Atmospheric Perspective
Before you had too much chardonnay, you may’ve noticed that the clouds in the distance appeared to be different.
They can appear to be paler, or even a slightly different colour. This is due to atmospheric perspective. Atmospheric perspective is most easily explained in this way:
When looking close to the horizon, your eye is generally looking through a large amount of dust (and pollution in some cases). This means that the clouds close to the horizon are tinted by this haze. The further away the clouds, the more “stuff” between you and them.
However, when looking directly upwards, we tend to look through much less interference from the atmosphere, and the clouds (and sky) appear “cleaner”.
This can often be more noticeable as the sun drops lower, and infuses all the clouds closest to it with light.
When painting skyscapes, understanding how to apply atmospheric perspective is a sensational tool for creating the illusion of distance.
Some great examples of atmospheric perspective can be seen along the skyscapes of the east coast of Australia. The air is full of oils & haze created by the many eucalypts. These tint the mountains, and all things in the distance a gorgeous blue.
Light
Wow. Where to begin. Let’s start with a crystal clear day, and a couple of fluffy white clouds. Sounds simple, doesn’t it? But. Is it Summer? Is it Winter? What difference will that make to your skyscapes? The light will be different.
In my part of the world, the wind tends to come from the North-East during Summer. That wind is laden with salt spray, and who knows what else. This filters and affects the light.
Winter, on the other hand, often gives us cooler, cleaner South-Westerly winds. This changes the light again. Unfortunately this homework will take you all year! (And possibly dozens of bottles of chardonnay to boot!). While there are differences, it’s not as dramatic as the light from a sunset or sunrise.
The point is to take notice of the way the seasons can change the light.
The light thrown around from a glorious sunset is breathtaking. Learning to identify and paint the colour shifts in a sunset, is a more complicated affair.
Let’s look at some basics.
As a general rule, the closer to the light source (ie sun), the warmer the colour.
The further you travel from the light source, the cooler the colours.
Watch your sunset, and notice the shift in hues from the clouds that are closest to the sun, to those that are further away. There will be a gradual progression from warm through to cooler. That shift in colour will often happen in individual clouds as well.
Fundamentally, that is the overriding rule when painting skyscapes.
It is very difficult to go into too much detail regarding this without taking up 40 pages or more. Truthfully, I wouldn’t put you through it. It hurts my head!
For me, it is enough to understand the shift from warm through to cool (more on that in a minute) and to develop some simple skills. This knowledge and some ability with a brush, along with close observation, should initially get you through painting realistic skyscapes.
Let’s move on to some painting skills.
Use a ground colour
I usually build up a painting with layers from dark to light, ending up with the thickest application of paint for the highlights. However, sometimes I decide to use the ground colour of the background for some of the highlights, as in this painting’s detail. This is a technique I often use to achieve vibrant sunsets.
To do this, prime your canvas with a bright orange or yellow and then add the clouds, greys and blues in the skies, making sure you let some of the ground colour show through, especially in the most vibrant parts of the sunset. Finish with some touches of bright yellow mixed with white to really enhance the focal points.
Paint in clouds
Having clouds that look like sheep or candy floss is a fear that most painters share. Clouds make lovely shapes in the sky, but when reproduced on canvas, they often look out of place. My advice is to view them as solid objects with three dimensions, which are affected by the sun. The sides of the clouds the furthest away from the sun should be the darkest, and the ones the closest should be the lightest.
But remember to vary the application of soft edges and hard edges. Thicker or whiter clouds can benefit from strong brushstrokes with hard edges, while thinner or paler ones could be suggested with more subtle marks.
Paint trees and skies
One of the reasons I love painting trees so much is the way the foliage and the sky overlap and mix in a beautiful way. The area where these two meet can be tricky to paint, however, as there is a risk of smudging the various colours together. To avoid this, I recommend working with layers. I usually paint the dark mass of the tree in a thin layer that dries quickly, before applying the colour of the sky around it and filtering through the leaves.
Here’s a little tip: the colour of the sky through the branches is a little darker than the actual sky. When the sky is fairly dry, I apply some small patches of leaves that detach from the tree to depict the loose branches.
Related articles:
- How to create glowing colours with oil paints
- How to mount your artwork
- Paint rippling water in oils
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