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Sebastian Aplin
Painting courses


Planning a painting
I was asked if students could spend more time on a painting, rather than producing lots of sketches, which got me thinking about how to...
sebastianaplin
Sep 26, 20242 min read
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Beyond the sketch
I found myself getting more and more involved with this object and its strange shapes. I particularly enjoyed seeing how a red object...
sebastianaplin
Sep 13, 20241 min read
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Still life sketching
Looking around the studio for another object to sketch I started on this circular saw... and just kept going. I was drawn into ways of...
sebastianaplin
Sep 12, 20241 min read
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Still life sketching
The oil painting courses at Stapleford Granary start a week today and so I thought you might like a preview of what we will be up to and...
sebastianaplin
Sep 11, 20241 min read
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Painting progress
With so many DIY skills I've been trying my hand at recently, I've been thinking about the process of getting stuff done within my...
sebastianaplin
Aug 30, 20242 min read
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Oil painting courses
Several people have asked me about choosing between the "Principles of oil painting" course (1:30 to 4 pm) or the "Advanced still life...
sebastianaplin
Aug 15, 20242 min read
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Negative shapes
I do go on about these, I know! Here's a Sargent landscape that illustrates this idea nicely. I love the way the shapes of the cloud,...
sebastianaplin
Apr 9, 20241 min read
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Translating ideas into painting (second part)
Although I knew that replicating the colours on the photo would lessen the impact of the painting, I was drawn in to using a broader...
sebastianaplin
Mar 27, 20241 min read
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Translating ideas into painting
In this post I want to go through some of the decisions that I'm making when preparing to paint a landscape, which may resonate with how...
sebastianaplin
Mar 26, 20242 min read
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Figure painting in watercolour
Next Saturday we'll continue exploring how to use the negative space in watercolour by painting some human figures/portraits. We'll do...
sebastianaplin
Feb 4, 20241 min read
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Lucian Freud modelling technique
Next Wednesday we are going to look at how Lucian Freud painted his portraits. We'll be working on a relatively small scale using hog's...
sebastianaplin
Jan 18, 20241 min read
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Still life composition
For our last meeting of this block we will be looking at composition, and if you type in "Still life composition" into the search box you...
sebastianaplin
Nov 24, 20231 min read
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Lemons and bananas
There probably hasn't been a more popular fruit for painters over the centuries than lemons. Like all simple spherical forms they are...
sebastianaplin
Nov 17, 20231 min read
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Visual texture
On Wednesday we'll be looking at visual texture and how it affects the way we "model form" as we have done up to now. Van Gogh's shoes...
sebastianaplin
Nov 10, 20231 min read
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Mediums for oil painting
First of all, it was great to see you all on Wednesday! The subject of mediums came up a few times and so I'll share what I know about...
sebastianaplin
Nov 3, 20232 min read
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Subject matter
It's hard to choose subject to paint for a still life, in part because objects seem to be uninteresting and so we look for something...
sebastianaplin
Oct 24, 20231 min read
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Light and volume
Sketching simple geometric objects is a good way to get used to observing how light reveals form. The main idea is to group together the...
sebastianaplin
Oct 16, 20231 min read
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Red pepper
Fruit and veg are usually a favourite in a still life painting because of their colour and interesting form. I wanted to go over some of...
sebastianaplin
Oct 10, 20232 min read
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Decision making process (part 2)
When I leave a painting overnight all the thoughts about where I want my painting style to go in general come to confront me the next...
sebastianaplin
Oct 6, 20231 min read
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Decision making process (part 1)
I wanted to record some of the thought process when I'm painting a still life. Part of the reason I find painting so fascinating is that...
sebastianaplin
Oct 5, 20232 min read
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