Learn the Art of Painting Roses – A Beginner’s Guide
Discover the joy of painting roses using acrylics with this step-by-step tutorial. Whether you’re a beginner or experienced artist, this easy technique will help you create stunning cabbage roses in any color you desire. Not only can you use this one-stroke method to paint roses on various surfaces like rocks, glass, or wood, but you can also practice your newfound skills with our vintage rose bouquet painting tutorial at the end of this post.
If you’re short on time, be sure to save this tutorial for later. Meanwhile, if you’re interested in more effortless flower painting tutorials, check out our popular guide on how to paint lavender with q-tips. Let’s dive into the world of roses!
Paint a Gorgeous Rose in Just 4 Steps
In this section, we’ll walk you through the four-step process to paint vibrant and lifelike 3D roses. Whether you want to incorporate these roses into a bouquet or create standalone pieces, the end result will be absolutely stunning.
What’s great about this technique is that you’ll achieve beautiful roses every time without any difficulties. So, let’s begin!
Step 1: Choose the Perfect Acrylic Paint Color
Selecting the right color is the most enjoyable part! Roses come in a variety of shades, including red, yellow, pink, purple, and blue. The key is to pick a color that speaks to you. When it comes to acrylic paint, you can use any soft or heavy-bodied acrylic paint, or even craft paint. Just ensure that it’s opaque and not transparent.
Next, we’ll guide you through creating shadows and highlights using your chosen color.
Roses in 4 Acrylic Paint Colors
- Main color: Use the paint straight from the tube.
- Shadow color: Mix a tiny amount of Burnt Umber (or any dark brown) with your main color.
- Highlight color: Mix your main color with Titanium White (or any white).
- Extra highlight color: Use pure Titanium White.
By the end, you should have four separate piles of acrylic paint on your palette ready to use: shadow, main color, highlight color, and extra highlight color.
Step 2: First Layer – One-Stroke Technique
Grab a small round brush (size 6 is recommended) and dip it into your main paint color. Use small curved strokes, resembling commas or mini boomerangs, to fill in the shape of your rose. Overlapping the strokes slightly will create a realistic look just like a real rose. You’ll notice that the outer petals have angular triangular shapes.
Don’t worry about achieving perfection with your comma strokes because we’ll be layering the paints in the next steps. Trust yourself, and know that your rose will look stunning in the end. For extra inspiration, refer to real rose pictures on Unsplash to get a better sense of rose shapes and petal arrangements.
Step 3: Adding Depth with Shadows
Clean your brush and pick up some of the shadow color. Using the same comma stroke, paint in the shadows of your rose petals. Fill in the white spaces around and between the strokes from step 1.
Step 4: Highlighting Your Rose Petals
Clean your brush again and load it with the highlight color. Starting from the middle of your rose, paint more comma strokes (petals) that extend all the way to the outer petals. These strokes should be slightly larger as they represent the outermost petals. By avoiding highlighted petals in the center of the rose, we create a sense of depth, giving the rose a 3D appearance.
Don’t worry if your highlight strokes overlap the layers below; in fact, they should. It’s perfectly fine if some of the main color and shadow color show through in certain areas. This adds dimension to your rose. In case you accidentally cover too much, don’t fret! Our YouTube tutorial will guide you on how to fix it.
Explore the Beauty of a Rose Bouquet
To further enhance your rose-painting skills, we have a delightful vintage rose bouquet tutorial in store for you. This step-by-step guide will teach you how to paint rose leaves, foliage, stems, and even include a charming pink bow. It makes for a wonderful gift for Valentine’s Day or Mother’s Day, offering a heartfelt alternative to a real bouquet.
If you’re looking for more creative ideas, you can also try painting your roses in a wreath format, similar to the lovely rose wreath tutorial by Tracie from Step-By-Step Painting.
Now, let’s jump right into the tutorial!
Full Video Tutorial on YouTube
If you prefer watching and learning through videos, we have a comprehensive YouTube tutorial available for you. Below the video, you’ll find a step-by-step breakdown with pictures and written instructions.
[YouTube Tutorial – How to Paint Roses](insert youtube link here)
Remember, with practice and passion, you’ll soon be able to paint beautiful roses with ease. Enjoy your artistic journey!
