I saw a ton of 'how to start drawing' on the sticky,

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I'd suggest familiarizing yourself with William Powell's books on Color Mixing Recipes. The sheer wealth of colours available in oils is something you have to be aware of.

I mixed a few of Powell's mixes and slotted them into a metal mesh grid in my backpack, which secures them easily for plein air painting.

Sorry for the image size, but you can see that the grid is arranged in R/B/Y.

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Start with a very limited palette.
Honestly, I'd even start with just black and white and focus on getting used to the medium.
Or if you want to go craaazy, get a nice burnt umber and white.

Just think of it as drawing in the beginning. Except you're just using paint, is all. No different really.
Focus on abstract shadow shapes. This will make or break you. Keep edges hard until you've gotten everything on the canvas (the drawing+shadow shapes).
Then blend for softer edges, and other gradients.

Keep things simple. They generally read better anyway.

Pic related although it's charcoal.
Don't get overwhelmed. Take your time, it's going to take a few attempts to get where you want to be.

With oil, it helps to use Gamsol (turpentine is toxic and smells horrible. Gamsol is non-toxic just very, very flammable...so store it in a jar to wash brushes and invest in a metal can to throw away any cloth/paper towel you might use with the gamsol.)
Mediums are nice too, Liquin is a good start. But just start with paint and gamsol and you should be good to go for a bit.

>>2861360
All that is true, but I feel like every oil painter comes to the same place ultimately--palette work.

I spent a lot of time drawing and digital "painting" but the place I finally had to settle down and really focus abs study was on that palette.

I'd jump right into color mixing right away. It's where I really learn the most. It even leveled up my graphite and charcoal work.

>>2861469
>I'd jump right into color mixing right away. It's where I really learn the most. It even leveled up my graphite and charcoal work.
Mind explaining how?

>>2861470
DrawMixPaint on Youtube had some great videos on color matching and mixing, though he seems to be strictly alla prima (which means you have to go elsewhere for good glazing info).

He's a very good painter though it's not to my taste. I guessed he painted a presidential portrait and now charges 75k a portrait, so he's credentialed anyway.

Definitely check his lessons out though.

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Keep going...

>>2861360
>>2861087
But what about the subject? I heard some people saying that I should start with still life then jump into portraits then full body stuff.

Mix a color chart, I don't care how boring you think it is, its essential for understanding how your pigments react with each other.

Do monochromatic studies of still life to get the feel of it and refine technique.

Later on buy richard schmid's alla prima book.

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Gave it a shot with acrylic. I'm not happy with it.

what I experienced

1. The brush is fucked and I can't get detailed with it
2. The paper is also fucked and leaves white spots not filled with color
3. The paint is VERY fucked and most of the time it felt like scrubbing this half-dried crusty paste around
4. The colors are fucked and they are far from the actual colors

What I learned:

1. The color is crucial to make things look good.
2. Acrylic dries too fast
3. I dont know how much sketching to do vs just paint and refine.

>>2864065
>2. Acrylic dries too fast
You can make a stay-wet palette with a large tuperware container, paper towels, and parchment paper (~$5 max). That will keep your palette from drying out on you. You can add an acrylic retarder to the paint to keep it wet on the support longer.

You can mix decent flesh tones just by using white and burnt sienna. I've been out of the loop for awhile but small portraits or icons seem like a good starting point for beginners.

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Buy a number of empty aluminium tunes to mix and preserve oil colours. Besides the tubes themselves, you'll need a palette knife, the basic colours prescribed by William F. Powell, and a pair of pliers to seal the tubes up!

>>2864065
Get or make a wet palette
Grab yourself some Slow-dry medium for acrylics (life saver for those who struggle with fast dry times)

Get yourself some cheap brushes but make sure they have some snap to them. Bright brushes are good for detailing.

Since it's acrylic, sometimes to get a soft edge you can paint a color down, paint another color and quickly scrub it with a clean brush or your finger.
You can try layering for soft gradients (green, greenblue, bluegreen, blue) too if you're having trouble.

Also it seems like you have a lot of white space inbetween forms...when painting acrylic you lay down a shape, and cut into it with another shape. Or put paint directly on top of paint.

If you want to save your drawing, you can always put the drawing on tracing paper backwards, transfer it to your canvas. if you ever need to reference the drawing you can just put the tracing paper back on the paint (since it dries plastic) and retransfer.

Or you can use acrylic like watercolor and creep up the painting.

>>2864211
>>2864088
thanks for the pointers!

>lay down a shape, and cut into it with another shape
this makes sense and would make the whole painting easier from the start.