I’ve gathered a few of the most common questions about my painting practice, answered below.
What kind of paint do you use?
I prefer to paint with oil paints and have been using Art Spectrum, an Australian brand, since high school art class. It’s still a go-to for me, along with Langridge, especially when I just want to get painting without mixing up my own colours.
When painting outdoors, I prefer to use opaque paints and titanium white rather than lead white. While lead white remains my favorite due to its stability, warmish hue, and transparency, I opt for titanium white in outdoor settings for its safety profile. It also has enough tinting strength to balance the intense chroma of modern colours.
I generally prefer a warm and cool hue of each of the primary colours. My plein air palette usually includes titanium white, ultramarine, cobalt, cerulean, and prussian blue; quinacridone red, cadmium red, quinacridone violet; viridian; cadmium yellow and yellow ochre, though I change it up depending on the light, the scene, and how I’m feeling that day.
What mediums do you use?
Generally, I prefer to use paint straight from the tube, but I’ll usually press it onto blotting paper first to leach out some of the excess oil. It helps give the paint more body and keeps it from feeling too slippery, while still leaving enough oil to keep it structurally sound.
Occasionally, I’ll use a small amount of Liquin (an alkyd based formulation manufactured by Winsor & Newton) towards the end of a painting to help with flow and transparency, but I avoid solvents like turpentine or spike oil altogether because they may interfere with the integrity of the paint layers.
I like to keep things simple as much as possible.
How do you prepare your painting surface?
These days, my choice of surface depends mostly on where I'm painting, the size of the work, and how many layers I plan to build. For plein air work, I prefer using MDF. I can be a bit rough on materials, and I find that flexible supports like canvas are too easy to damage. MDF works well for me because it’s affordable, easy to prepare, and smooth, perfect for my brushwork. Here’s how I typically prepare my MDF panels:
For a more absorbent surface, I apply 2 layers of Liquitex Professional Gesso (front, back, and edges). For less absorbency, I go for 3 layers of gesso. For one-layer paintings, I apply 3 layers of gesso and finish with a thin, brushed-on layer of leftover oil paint.
Sometimes, I’ll add a neutral imprimatura (a thin layer of warm or cool grey, or a light brown) to set the tone, depending on the weather, the light, or my mood that day. I always bring a few pre-toned panels when I’m painting outdoors, and pick the one that feels right in the moment.
For the ground layers, I avoid solvents like gum turpentine, spike oil of lavender, or odourless mineral spirits because I don’t want to compromise the structure of the oil paint.
If I do use linen or canvas (which is rare), I usually make my own strainers from Tasmanian Oak or buy inexpensive cotton canvases from art stores. I’ll remove the cotton canvas and reuse the stretcher bars, then stretch loom-state linen (medium to heavy weight, plain weave), apply two layers of rabbit skin glue, followed by two layers of Williamsburg Lead Oil ground, and then wait 6 to 12 months before painting on it.
What kind of brushes or tools do you use to paint with?
I’ve tried all sorts of brush shapes, sizes, and hair types over the years, and I even make my own brushes. Not ashamed to say I’ve used my own hair! My favourites are the flats, especially the long flats. I use them for just about everything. A fresh long flat sable gives you such a sharp, crisp edge, it’s hard to beat. I love short flats (or brights) for bold strokes, scumbling, or laying in a lot of paint.
I have a few long filberts by Neef. After many hours of working with them, they grind done to a kind of pencil shape and become really good for drawing with, that's what I mainly use them for, for laying in the drawing at the start and fixing the drawing as I go along.
I don’t use rounds as much, but they come in handy for things like painting leaves or the contours of a shape. Liners are great for fine details, tree branches, signing my name, that sort of thing.
tend to prefer natural hair brushes for the random, gritty textures they give. That said, synthetics have their place too. A few favourites: the long flat ox hair sable from Raphael, the synthetic Eclipse long flats by Rosemary & Co, and pretty much anything from the Neef 1150 interlocking bristle range, long or short flats.
I also love using palette knives, big or small. My favourites are the small ones with rounded edges; they’re great for creating long, flowing, turning lines. There’s something really satisfying about the way they move through the paint.
Honestly, I could talk about brushes all night, and probably still be going the next day… and the day after that.
Do you varnish your paintings?
If you get 10 painters in a room, you’ll probably get 11 different answers. For me, it really depends. Most of the time, I don’t varnish, and that lines up with the aesthetic I’m going for.
Impressionist painters like Camille Pissarro often preferred a matte finish. In fact, he and his son Lucien would even write on the back of their paintings not to varnish them, because it disrupted the tonal values, darks became too deep and saturated, and yellows and whites could darken or shift over time.
When you look out at the world, most things don’t shine. Light is usually soft and matte, unless it’s raining or you’re staring straight into the sun. So for me, a glossy surface can feel a bit artificial when I’m painting outdoors, trying to capture a fleeting moment.
That said, not varnishing comes with trade-offs. Without it, the painting isn’t protected from dust, UV light, or other environmental damage, so it’s a fine balance. Varnish acts like a shield, but it also introduces its own set of issues. It can crack over time and might need to be removed and replaced, which is a tricky and delicate job. A lot of matte varnishes also contain wax, which changes the chemistry of the paint layer and can complicate things further. Blooming (trapping of moisture beneath the varnish) is also another issue to contend with.
If I do varnish, I’m careful about what I use, whether that’s a modern synthetic varnish or something more traditional like dammar. Timing matters too. The general rule is to wait about 12 months for the paint layers to fully cure before varnishing. What brush to use is another topic painters can get passionate about as well.
In my case, it’s not a one-size-fits-all thing. It all comes down to the painting itself, and the feeling I want it to have.
How do you carry your wet paintings around?
For most of my painting life I used to carry my canvas or board in one hand and my French easel in the other, and my paints and everything else in a backpack.
I decided to buy some commercial carry cases to carry my panels in but as good as they were, they tended to get damaged and breakdown after a period of time and they were quite expensive.
So I decided to make my own out of some MDF and premium plywood. That way, I could customise the sizes of my panels as well.
The bigger one weighs about 3kg and can carry 4 mdf panels 44x27cm, the smaller one weighs about 3.5kg and can carry 8 panels 30x22cm when fully loaded. I'm going to try and use thinner and lighter wood to construct my next ones.
Keeping the weight as low as possible is the key.
Do you accept commissions?
At this time, I don’t accept commissions. I prefer to focus on creating work that comes naturally to me, painting what inspires me in the moment.
How should I care for a painting?
Oil paintings are pretty hardy when handled with care. Try to hang the work somewhere out of direct sunlight, away from sources of heat or moisture, so not right above a fireplace or next to a steamy bathroom. A stable, dry environment is ideal.
Dust it gently now and then with a soft, dry brush or clean microfiber cloth, don’t spray anything onto it. And if the surface ever gets marked or dull over time, it’s best to talk to a professional conservator rather than try and clean or varnish it yourself.
A well-made oil painting should last generations if looked after right.
How long does it take to complete a painting?
A colour study usually takes me around 30 minutes. A more finished outdoor painting can take anywhere from 1 to 4 hours, spread across one to three sittings (sometimes four), depending on the light, the scene, and how everything unfolds. I prefer returning to the same spot, ideally during the same season, at the same time of day, and under similar weather conditions.
I also do sketches, colour notes, and write about the scene in my journal, and I may add a layer or two in the studio based on all the information I’ve gathered.
If you have any further questions please let me know below!