Hi, I'm Donna DeBerry, artist and creator of the Folk Art One Stroke Technique brought
to you by Plaid.
The Folk Art One Stroke Learn to Paint Program makes painting really easy.
With the One Stroke Technique, you paint flowers and veggies and all my favorite designs.
The secret is that I blend and shade and highlight in one stroke.
The way I do that is with these wonderful new brushes.
The first one we're going to go over is the 3 quarter inch flat brush, which has a really
nice chisel edge.
See that?
It's got thick bristles so it holds paint really well and you need it to hold a lot
of paint as you're doing my stroke work.
I use this large brush for a lot of my projects so you have to get used to using that.
This number 12 flat brush I use for smaller pieces that I'm working with also has a very
good chisel edge, which is very important.
The third brush I have to work with is this wonderful scruffy brush.
It has real thick bristles that fan out.
They're very soft so they pounce well.
Because of the oval, you have some control better on that brush as you're trying to do
your little spongy flowers and the moss and all that you're going to paint with that.
The last brush that we have is a number 2 script liner, real thick bristles here so
it holds a lot of paint for a long time so you can get those nice curly cues, which I
love.
It has long bristles with a little point on there so you can do a lot of detail work.
I'm real excited about those brushes and I'm excited for you to have them to paint with.
What I'm going to talk to you about now is the folk art paint.
This is my favorite paint because it has real thick, creamy consistency and it strokes out
really well in my one stroke technique.
It has vivid bright colors and you have to remember folk art paint is the decorative
painter's choice worldwide.
The reusable teaching guide makes it really easy to learn how to paint because you stroke
right over my painting and you're able to wipe it off and practice again until you get
those strokes down.
The thing we're going to go over now is how to load your palette so that we can begin
to paint on these teaching guides.
We're going to use berry wine, one of those vivid wonderful colors I love.
We're going to squirt out about a dime size of paint.
We're going to use wicker white and we're going to put about the same amount and we
want those pretty close to each other if you can see that.
We're going to use the number, the three quarter inch flat brush is what we're going to use
to paint on this guide.
It's going to be the rose guide and we're going to brush right back and forth in this
paint so you need it close to each other so that it blends well into each other and this
is a dry brush.
You want to get it on into that brush and I don't want you to use water when you're
loading this brush because you want it to, the water will muddy it up and you don't want
to do that.
We're going to pick up that paint and we're going to come right over to the teaching guide
and we're going to start right here where I have the line so that you can lay that chisel
edge on that line and then you're going to put pressure, push, go up and down back to
the second line that we have and lift up on the chisel edge.
Now we're going to try that one more time.
See we've done it a few times so you can practice a couple of times and feel comfortable.
There's a third time and see I still have plenty of paint on there and see how nice
it blends in with each other.
Now when I pick up paint again I'm going to lay the edge of the paint, of the brush in
one color and then the other edge into the other color and you want to keep these triangles
on your brush as you're picking up.
Don't let them get mixed up into each other because then you lose your shading.
Now we're going to do the bottom half of the rose bud.
You're going to start right at that chisel edge again.
We're going to put pressure, push, come down like a U and back up on that chisel edge.
Start again, push, come down, back up to that chisel edge and see we have it about three
times here for you to practice over and over until you feel comfortable.
This is how we're going to form the rose bud.
Now what we're going to do next is we're going to show you how to do the apron to the cabbage
rose and we start out on this chisel edge again.
You lay your brush down, you push the bristles out very far, you slightly wiggle as you go
around and you lift up on the chisel edge.
I'm going to need a little bit more paint there and you can tell when you need more
paint because it doesn't blend as well.
Start on that chisel edge again, push, slightly wiggle as you go around, see how nice that
color is when you have enough paint and you end on the chisel edge.
See how it blends from that real intense berry wine to the wicker white?
That's what you want to achieve.
Now we're going to layer these petals.
We're going to start right here.
See you have to turn your hand around sometimes and head the other way which is fine.
So you keep picking up paint.
Now it shows you how to layer right over that to the second petal and we're going to form
a whole circle.
Start on this guide here on this side, it's going to show you step by step how to lay
that on there, those petals.
Here's a blank one for you to see if you can just fill it in without having... There you
go.
All right, the next thing we're going to do is go over the leaves.
To do the leaves, you've got to wash out your brush.
This is the only time you put it in water.
When you're washing out that berry wine color, dry off the brush.
We've got to add more paint to the palette.
We're going to add the green.
This is green forest.
We're going to pick up again.
Remember we're going to blend in between this.
This is how we're going to load the brush.
You only do that at the beginning.
We're going to come right to your sheet.
Start on that chisel edge.
Now this is real important.
I want you to spread those bristles.
I want you to follow the green edge of my leaf as you go around because it's slightly
wiggling.
See that?
You lift up to the chisel edge.
Now we've done it two or three times here.
We pick up more paint.
We've done it two or three times here for you to keep practicing over that.
Lift to the chisel edge.
See lots of pressure.
Lift to the chisel edge.
Now we do the same thing on the reverse side.
Turn that brush up on the chisel edge.
Can you see that?
It's real important.
You push, wiggle, slightly lift to the chisel edge.
All right.
You do that three times on there.
What's great about this, remember, you can just take and wipe this right off and practice
right over it again if you're not happy with what you've done.
I'm going to show you how to use a scruffy brush on here though.
Starts with the purple and the wicker white.
This is dioxazine pure pigment purple.
I'm going to squirt some of that out there.
I love that color because it's really nice, dark, and tense.
When I break it down with my white, it makes it really nice because you have really dark
values and real light all the way down to the white, which is really good.
See how I load this?
You have a lot of purple and white definitely separate on your brush, and you just pounce
right on top of this.
No water, and you don't want to over pounce.
When you over pounce, you lose the blending, and if you use water, you're going to lose
the blending, so be sure not to do that.
What's fun on this sheet here, if you forget while you're working, is it shows you how
to load your palette and how to load your brush.
Now, after we wipe all this off, we're going to turn this over, and on the reverse side,
we're going to go step by step.
See, you just add a little bit of water, wipe this all off, and take a paper towel and
just dry it off.
Then we're going to turn it over, and on this side, we're going to build step by step.
We're going to add the stroke work on top of each other to form the finished product,
which is a rosebud.
First, we're going to stroke in between here, load that brush, and we're going to start
on chisel edge, remember, push and go up the hill, back down to the chisel edge.
All right, so now we're going to do the second half, which is lower, like a U on the bottom
half.
See, we need more paint.
You can tell when you're going to need more paint, because you lose your color there.
You can stroke right over that again.
If you're not happy with it.
There's one, two, and then the third step is the second layer of petals on the bottom
there.
What's nice is it shows you your chisel edge lines, and it shows you the direction you're
supposed to go.
All right, now let's try doing this rose petal.
I mean, the cabbage rose apron here.
You're going to do the steps around.
One, two, probably about five or six of those, all the way around.
You have to turn your arm around to be able to get those comfortably around.
You can start from the other side.
You don't have to go the same way every time.
What's fun about this is that you can stroke right on top of my work and make sure that
you're spreading your brush bristles far enough open.
Then this is the second layer of petals you do, right on top of that apron there.
You put that rose bud right in that center.
This rose bud you did up here, and then you're ready to come right in here with these little
chisel edges.
That's just double loaded right in on chisel edge the whole time.
What's fun about this is that it has all the purple and the leaves and everything.
You can just layer it on top of each other.
Let's start our project.
What we're going to paint today is clay pots.
I love clay pots.
They're inexpensive, a great thing for you to start painting on because you don't mind
if you go through a few of them.
They're great for gifts.
There's all kinds of fun things we can paint on them through my projects.
What we're going to do is base coat this clay pot.
I've got a pot already ready for you, base coated.
I used my three quarter inch brush and the wicker white paint.
I coated it really well and coated the inside too.
That's totally up to you if you want to do that or seal the inside of it.
Then what I want you to do is take your reusable teaching guide and look at the pattern we've
got on the bottom of the guide, which is totally finished, and kind of use that placement to
do your design on your pot.
We're going to take our berry wine and our wicker white, which we've been using on our
reusable guide, and we're going to start stroking that apron onto the spot.
Remember we're going to go all the way around in a circle.
We want to make sure that those petals overlap on each other.
Then we want to put the bud in the middle right here.
We're going to put that second skirt.
See, one, two, three.
See how I turn the brush around?
What makes it easier for you to paint?
Now on the chisel edge, on the tip of the bristles, we're going to do these little chiseled
edge strokes right in the middle there to finish up that rose.
Now we're going to come over here and put a bud.
See the little layers of that bud?
Pick up more paint and put another bud right over here like your pattern shows.
Then we're ready to put our green in.
Now I'm switching to my number 12 flat brush for this because you don't have much area
to paint and it'll be a lot easier for you.
I come right in here, put in that full leaf.
There's the second half of it.
Turn that chisel edge around so you come up on your chisel edge.
Bring the stem in there with the edge of your brush.
Come around on these buds and make the leaves around the bud.
Put another large leaf down here.
See I keep picking up the green and the white.
See if you do any stroke work, do it right there in the beginning.
The beginning of your leaf right there.
See you make a couple strokes to get it like you want it and come up on the chisel edge.
Pull that stem in the middle of the leaf with the chisel edge.
Come around the rose, see you're going right over wet paint, doesn't even mess it up at
all.
It's because of that consistency of that folk art paint and how creamy and thick it is.
It doesn't pick up the other color.
See how nice that is?
I went right on top of wet paint to do that.
Let's put another little leaf right there.
Now we want to pick up the scruffy brush.
For now I put half purple, half white and you want to keep it like that on your brush
so you see two different colors on the brush.
You're going to pounce.
Now if you over pounce this, you're going to take away all your shading.
See this?
Let's roll it over here and do some over here.
See I'm right on top of wet paint.
Pick up a little bit more paint and I can go right on that white paint.
I mean over that paint, it doesn't even muddy it up.
Add a little bit more white in there if you want it.
A little bit up here.
Now we're ready for the script liner.
Now this is the only time you're going to add water is when you're making the curlicues.
You're going to add water until you're going to ink an inky consistency.
You're going to roll your brush in it and that's why you need those long bristles so
it holds a lot of paint.
And then we're going to roll this around.
Do that script liner on there.
And then maybe right in here, sign your name.
See how I'm steady in my hand and just moving the fingers that are holding the brush?
That makes it really easy.
Now wasn't that fun?
These are real inexpensive gifts and I want you to play around on pots because they don't
hurt so much.
If they, to try, you can try a lot of projects that way and not be too expensive.
Because using that reusable teaching guide was so easy and made those roses so simple
to do.
I want to do another one with you and we're going to do the pansy one.
On this, I've already got the palette ready for you so we're just going to switch palettes
and pull out all our new colors which we have school bus yellow, wicker white, pure pigment
dioxazine purple and green forest.
And what we want to do first on these brush strokes, we did the bottom part of the little
pansy which is yellow and purple.
So we're going to clean this brush out from our roses.
And see how I dried that water off now and we're going to pick up the yellow and the
purple and just blend that in just a little bit.
Okay?
We're going to come over here and start where I have the line.
We have little arrows there to show you.
You push down, come up and lift back up to the line.
Let's turn this a little bit.
Start right here on that chisel edge, push, turn back to the chisel line and lift up.
See those little arrows showing you just what to do.
You make those little strokes all the way across here.
You can tell when you need paint because you start losing your blending.
Just go all the way across.
By the time you get through, I figure by the end of the row, you probably got it down pat
where you can do that part of the step.
All the way down.
You want to keep that purple really good on that outside edge because that makes a real
crisp bottom.
Let's go over that a little.
Okay.
Now we're going to clean out this yellow because these petals right here are the side and the
top petal.
There's three at the top of the pansy.
We're going to load this with white and purple.
This is that number 12 flat if I didn't tell you.
I want you to use this one for this sheet.
It tells you right here on your sheet so it makes it really easy.
You line up right here on the chisel edge where the tip of the bristles are is where
the straight line is where you want to be.
You push and you spread out those bristles.
Look how hard I'm spreading those.
You slowly go around the way the arrows are all the way around and lift up on the chisel
edge.
Okay.
Let's do that a few more times.
Start right here.
See, you stroke a little bit right there if it's not quite blending like you want it.
And come all the way around and lift up on the chisel edge.
See, it's easier when you go faster.
Try to fill in the whole area that I painted.
It's easier to go this way for my hand.
Lift up on the chisel edge.
Do a couple more.
See how I slightly wiggle that as I go?
Push, spread.
See how far those bristles are?
Wiggle slightly around, turn around up to the chisel edge.
And now this is the top petal.
You have two sides.
There's one side.
There's a second side.
And we're going to start here again.
This is the one right at the top of the pansy.
So I'm kind of showing you how to do it in each direction so you get comfortable with
that.
And keep picking up the purple and white.
So you want that really nice.
With pansies, sometimes I want it to be mostly white and just a little bit of purple.
Mostly yellow with just a little bit of purple on the edge.
All right.
So now what we want to do, I'm going to use this number 12 flat also for these leaves.
And I'm going to pick up the school bus yellow and the green forest.
We're going to stroke between those.
I'm loading the brush right now.
And then we're going to pick up a little bit more paint and make sure we have plenty of
green on it.
And we're going to start again at that line, the chisel line.
And we're going to push really hard.
Take those bristles and see, keep that green edge.
If you naturally just keep it along the edge where I've done mine, it will turn around
and come up on the chisel edge.
You'll form the leaf.
Stroke around up on the chisel edge.
See how nice it makes the shading?
If you put enough pressure on the brush, what a lot of people do, and I want you to work
on not doing this, is a lot of people will just stay right up on those bristles and not
put pressure, and it turns out like that.
So you want to push really hard and turn around up on the chisel edge.
And see how nice and how pretty that shading is?
All right.
This is really fun.
I use these vines for everything.
I use them with brown and white or green and white.
Today we're going to use this with yellow and green.
And we're going to stay up on that chisel edge and kind of hold this brush like it's
a feather, really light in your hand.
Start right here and you're lifting the edge that's going away from you up slightly so
that you're trailing those last bristles of this brush, these very last bristles.
You're trailing those behind you and you're wiggling back and forth right on top of that.
All right.
So those are the vines you kind of put around.
So when you put the pansy on top of the vines, it looks real natural.
Now the last thing, well, next to the last thing we have on here are the little center
to the pansy.
And I use the yellow and the green again.
And I put the yellow going upward.
And you're stroking downward.
You just put one stroke in the middle and two strokes on both sides.
That's the chisel edge.
And you're pushing down towards you.
You're pulling it towards you.
That's a better way to say it.
There you go.
All right.
So now we want to use the script liner.
We're going to pick up.
Remember, this is the only time you use water.
We're going to roll that brush in there.
And I've got a little trick to show you on this that people really like.
And that's my little finger.
See where my little finger's going?
Wherever that little finger's going is where my art, where my curly keys are going to go.
And I lower the tip of that brush slowly till it touches the pallet.
And I stay up on that tip all the way.
See how fun that is?
Now that was a hard thing to learn.
It's really easy if you do it the way I just showed you.
But the pictures are right here for you so that you can step by step remember how I showed
you.
All right.
Now you can wipe that off.
But I'm just going to flip it over so we can start on this and kind of let you look at
this really quick.
Even if we don't have time to do the whole thing, we're going to show you that we put
the first petal, then the second, then the third.
See it's just layered on the front of this.
Let's pick up the purple and the white again.
I'm going to blend it because I had no paint on my brush.
And we're going to stroke the work right on there.
There's one, two.
Let's go on down here so we can get it done.
There's one.
Here's the center.
Two, three.
And then we're going to pick up yellow and purple.
Pull these down.
And then you're ready for the center.
The center was the yellow and green.
So we're picking up the yellow and the green.
And we're just going to add this one, two, three in the middle.
Wasn't that fun?
Are you ready to begin painting?
The beginner kit makes it so easy.
Everything you need is included.
There are three books with designs for everyone.
These are the projects featured in the Folk Art One Stroke program.
As you can see, I've painted on a variety of surfaces.
And these projects are wonderful for home decorating.
And they make great gifts.
Now you have seen how easy it is to do the Folk Art One Stroke painting technique.
The Learn to Paint program from Plaid is all you need to make painting easy.
Premium quality Folk Art acrylics are the choice of decorative painters worldwide.
Perfect for the one stroke painting method, Folk Art's long open time and rich smooth
consistency make for perfect brush strokes every time straight from the bottle.
Folk Art offers the working characteristics of oil paint with the convenience of acrylics.
And when it comes to color, Folk Art has the largest palette available, 249 total colors
to include metallics and pure pigments and 26 new colors.