Acrylics vs. Oils - Painting

Oils and Acrylics are both awesome painting mediums depending on what kind of a project you are doing and in what conditions. Bellow is a table showing the qualities of both paints which may help you choose which is the right medium for you to work with. Oils are oil soluble and dry slowly where as Acrylics are water soluble are dry quickly. Oils are better for blending because of the viscosity of the oil medium. Viscosity determines how quickly the paint sets, remains moist and workable. Acrylic paints tend to set much quicker and mixing is better done on the palette than on the surface. If you are a beginner painter usually a teacher will recommend you get started with Acrylics because there are less technicalities to it and it is cleaner.  However if you live in a hot or dry area such as Arizona and you want to paint outside, then I would strongly recommend trying oil paints. Acrylics tend to dry so quickly in hot and dry conditions that they become very difficult to work with. One benefit of oil paints is that you can work on a painting for days without the surface becoming dry, this allows you to mix the paints on the surface, and blend nicely, creating smooth transitions. With Acrylics on the other hand this is almost impossible, on the other hand if you want your painting to be handled soon after, then acrylic is better. One of my favorite acrylic sets is the Blickrylic student sets. They are cheap, have good pigment, mixability, and opaqueness. Only downside is the lack of color options. 

For the mural painting at the bottom of this post, I used all acrylic paint. It was a good choice because at the size of 7' x 7', I saved a lot of money by choosing acrylics over oils. Another reason I used acrylics is because of my style of painting which is unplanned, often requires lots of changes and repainting of certain areas. Because Acrylic dries quickly I could completely paint over an area without making a mess by having the paints mix. Also by thinning down the upper most layer I could achieve a nice semistransparent effect in some areas giving nice depth of color. With oil I would have to wait longer until the bottom layer dried. The downside, was that if I ever wanted to blend a new color with a layer beneath, I would have to either thin down the paint significantly, or remix the color below again.   

Oils

Oil based








Dry slowly




Cleans with mineral spirits




Good for blending

Oil based paints require mineral spirits for use as a solvent and oil (such as linseed or walnut) for increasing the drying time, glazing, adding shine. Brushes need to be cleaned in mineral spirits.

This allows for paint to be workable longer



Thins with mineral spirits such as turpentine or gamsol. This breaks down the oils in the paint and speeds up drying time.

Because oil paint sets slowly, the paint remains workable longer and can mix easily with newly applied layers.

Acrylics

Water based








Dry Fast




Cleans with water





Not so good for blending


        

Simply add water to dilute the paint, make it thinner and increase drying time. Brushes can be cleaned with water.




Use indoors or in cool, humid environment. Use a hair dryer to set paint in minutes.

Easy to clean when wet, but permanent once dry.




Acrylics dry too quickly to blend well on the surface.