Pastel Painting Step-by-step

This is a practical and comprehensive guide for all soft pastel painting enthusiasts, from the beginner to the experienced artist. Starting with advice on materials, it moves on to pastel basics such as blending, adding tone and using a limited palette, then there is a section on landscape painting featuring advice on composition and painting trees and water, then capturing light in pastels, with tips on colour mixing, and finally there is a section of flower painting, with additional information on adding water to pastels. Throughout, the art of painting in pastels is taught through beautiful, easy to follow step by step projects, with a total of 13 included, and each section is accompanied by a selection of inspirational paintings by the three featured artists, in a rich variety of styles.
Uses material from the following titles in the Step-by-Step Leisure Arts series:
Painting with Pastels by Peter Coombs
Landscapes in Pastel by Paul Hardy
Flowers in Pastel by Margaret Evans
Light in Pastel by Paul Hardy

13 demonstrations
• Over 250 step by step photographs
• An excellent reference book for beginners and experienced artists

Jan 13

Based on previously published material, Pastel Painting Step-by-Step brings together the work of Margaret Evans, Paul Hardy and Peter Coombs to help you to master the pastel medium. The three artists bring a good balance of work to the book, with Peter Coombs and Paul Hardy covering landscapes and townscapes, while Margaret Evans concentrates on flowers. Sections on using a limited palette, composition, colour mixing and colours for painting flowers, are interspersed with 13 demonstrations accompanied by good, clear step-by-step photographs.

Feb 13

Based on four earlier books on the subject by the above authors, this is a comprehensive guide to the art of using pastels. I like the way that what you need to buy and the differences between pastels is dealt with once only at the beginning, leaving out this part from the other three sections. You don’t need as much to take up this aspect of art as most others and there is even a helpful section on working with a limited palette, as well as another on what colors to buy for flower paintings. This is, like most Search Press books, a very hands-on approach with a minimum of theory for its own sake and a maximum of learning through actual painting. The book contains thirteen different projects to work through as well as many other things to try out, enabling even a beginner to get some professional-looking results. Each project tells you what you need and has a good number of stages, each with a short caption telling you what to do next and a photograph showing the picture with the next steps added. It is a great way to learn, and I particularly liked having three different approaches to play with and three different artists to learn from. This way there is less of a chance of slavish copying, and a good look at more than one style in pastel painting. Sometimes I think that compendiums take away too much from the individual books but this is an effective one for the above reasons. An excellent tool for those who want to learn pastel painting, or improve their technique.

Feb 13

Written by a team of three experienced artists, this thorough guide exposes the reader to a variety of viewpoints, techniques, subjects and tricks. It covers all the basics of this medium, including materials, color blending, mark making, texture, perspective and composition. Ph