uIf you’re oil painting, you’ll need to use SOLVENTS! But do you know how and why they work? Gum Turpentine is pretty special, and cannot be mixed up with Mineral Turpentine.
Recently, one of our students was using gum turpentine to clean his brushes, and Stephen had to chat with him about why that’s a bad idea. But, new students don’t know all the different types of solvents, or what they do, so it’s an easy mistake to make. It did however show us that this was something worth chatting about, so here we go!
In this video you will learn:
- What is mineral turpentine used?
- What does mineral turpentine do to oil paint?
- How to thin oil paint with gum turpentine
- Odourless Solvent Turpentine
DON’T: Use Mineral Turpentine to thin your paint
Mineral Turpentine’s job is purely to clean brushes. It’s designed to strip the oil and the gunk out of your brushes and make them nice and fluffy. You don’t use this to thin your paint. Mineral Turpentine robs the pigment of any protection. Oil paints made up of oil. Mineral Turpentine chews oil, it destroys the oil and it eats it.
Mineral Turpentine is a white-spirit hydrocarbon solvent commonly used for cleaning brushes and equipment after painting.
DO: Use Pure Gum Turpentine to thin your paint
What we use when to thin, pure turpentine or gum turpentine. Why is it called that? Gum Turpentine is actually distilled from the sap of pine trees. Gum Turpentine effectivity thins the paint.
Pure Gum Turpentine is ideal for use when cleaning art brushes and can be helpful when preparing to paint. It’s ideal for use with oil paints.
