List of Oil Painting Techniques: 30 Methods Explained

Oil painting has accumulated techniques over roughly six centuries, from the layered methods of early Netherlandish painters to the thick, gestural paint of modern abstraction. Some are fundamental and used in almost every painting; others are specialized tools for particular effects.

This list of oil painting techniques groups them by purpose, with a short explanation of how each works, when to use it, and how difficult it is. For a deeper look at how experienced painters apply and combine these methods, see our guide to the best oil painting techniques for professionals.

Quick Reference Table

Preparation Techniques

1. Imprimatura (Toned Ground)

A thin, transparent layer of color applied over a white primed surface. Earth tones such as burnt sienna or raw umber are common. It gives a mid-tone to judge values against and can glow through later layers.

Use it when: starting almost any painting. Tip: wipe back with a rag to keep it light and even.

2. Underpainting

A first layer that establishes composition and values, usually in one or a few colors. Variants include:

• Grisaille: grays, often for later glazing.
• Brunaille: browns, typically burnt umber.
• Verdaccio: greenish gray, traditionally associated with flesh painting.
• Color underpainting: complementary colors beneath the final colors, such as red under green foliage, for vibrancy.

Use it when: painting complex subjects or planning layered work.

Application Methods

3. Alla Prima (Wet-on-Wet)

Painting a picture in a single session while all paint stays wet. It requires decisive mixing and confident strokes. Many Impressionist and plein air painters worked largely this way.

Use it when: painting outdoors, making studies, or seeking spontaneity.

4. Indirect Painting (Layered Method)

Building a painting in successive layers that dry between sessions: underpainting, dead coloring, color layers, glazes. It offers control and optical depth at the cost of time.

Use it when: working on detailed, highly finished paintings.

5. Fat Over Lean

Less a technique than a structural rule: each layer should contain equal or more oil than the one beneath. Lean, solvent-thinned layers go first; oil-rich layers go on top. It reduces the risk of cracking as paint cures.

Paint Handling and Layering Techniques

6. Blending

Softening the boundary between two colors or values while wet. Methods include feathering with a soft brush, dragging a clean dry brush across the boundary, or mixing intermediate tones and laying them side by side.

Use it when: painting skies, skin and rounded forms.

7. Glazing

Applying a thin, transparent layer of color, usually mixed with a glazing medium, over a dry layer. Light passes through the glaze and reflects off the layer beneath, producing rich, luminous color.

Use it when: deepening shadows, unifying color, or adding warmth or coolness without repainting. Transparent pigments such as ultramarine, alizarin crimson, quinacridones and phthalos are ideal.

8. Velatura

Similar to glazing, but the layer is semi-opaque, often containing a little white. It veils the underlying layer, softening or lightening it while letting some of it show.

Use it when: adjusting skin tones or creating subtle atmosphere.

9. Scumbling

Scrubbing a thin, broken layer of opaque, usually lighter paint over a dry darker layer, letting bits of the lower layer show through. It creates haze, softness and texture.

Use it when: painting atmosphere, distant hills, mist and soft light.

10. Wiping Out

Removing paint from a wet layer with a rag, brush or cotton swab to reveal lighter values or the ground beneath. It is a subtractive way to create lights.

Use it when: working on a toned underpainting or quickly establishing light shapes.

11. Tonking

Pressing absorbent paper, such as newsprint, onto a wet, overloaded painting and peeling it away to remove excess paint, leaving a thinner surface that retains the image. Named after Henry Tonks, a British painter and teacher.

Use it when: the paint has become too thick to work into.

Texture Techniques

12. Impasto

Applying paint thickly so strokes stand out from the surface. It catches real light and adds physical presence, especially in highlights. Impasto medium can extend paint.

Use it when: emphasizing focal points or adding energy.

13. Dry Brush

Dragging a brush with very little paint over a dry, textured surface so the paint catches only on high points.

Use it when: painting grass, bark, fur, weathered wood or sparkle on water.

14. Sgraffito

Scratching through a wet top layer with a pointed tool to reveal the layer beneath. It produces lines and textures that brushes cannot.

Use it when: adding grasses, hair, signatures or abstract linear marks.

15. Palette Knife Painting

Using knives instead of brushes to apply and spread paint. It creates crisp edges, flat planes and ridges.

Use it when: painting bold landscapes, architecture or abstract textures.

16. Stippling

Applying paint in small dots or dabs with the tip of a brush. It suggests texture, foliage and vibrating color.

17. Grattage

Scraping paint off the canvas, often over a textured object placed beneath, to create patterns. It is associated with Surrealist experimentation.

18. Frottage

Rubbing or pressing a textured object into wet paint, or rubbing over textures, to transfer patterns.

19. Cold Wax Painting

Mixing cold wax medium with oil paint to create a thick, matte paste that can be layered, scraped and incised. Best on rigid panels.

Use it when: seeking layered, earthy, sculptural surfaces, especially in abstraction.

Color and Value Design Techniques

20. Broken Color

Placing separate strokes of color side by side instead of fully mixing them, so they combine optically at a distance. Associated with Impressionism.

Use it when: painting light effects and vibrant surfaces.

21. Chiaroscuro

Strong contrast between light and dark to model form and create drama. The extreme version, tenebrism, uses deep darkness with sharply lit areas.

Use it when: painting dramatic portraits and still lifes.

22. Sfumato

Extremely soft, gradual transitions between tones, so edges appear smoky and imperceptible. Often associated with Leonardo da Vinci’s work.

Use it when: painting soft features and atmospheric transitions. It requires patience and many thin layers.

23. Tonalism

Organizing a painting around a dominant tone or limited, muted color range, often for atmospheric landscapes.

Use it when: painting mood, dusk and fog.

24. Limited Palette Painting

Restricting the palette to a few colors, such as white, yellow ochre, red and black. It produces harmony and trains color mixing.

25. Color Temperature Modeling

Describing form through shifts between warm and cool color rather than value alone, for example cool shadows with warm lights.

Edge and Surface Techniques

26. Lost and Found Edges

Deliberately varying edges between hard, soft and lost (where two shapes merge with no visible boundary). Hard edges attract attention; lost edges let forms dissolve into shadow or background. Controlling edges is one of the main differences between beginner and experienced work.

Use it when: directing the viewer’s eye toward a focal point and creating depth.

27. Blocking In

Laying down large, simplified shapes of color and value before refining. It keeps the whole painting progressing together rather than finishing one corner at a time.

Use it when: starting any painting after the drawing stage.

28. Oiling Out

Rubbing a very thin layer of oil or medium onto areas of a dry painting that have “sunk in,” meaning they look dull and matte compared with the rest. It restores saturation so you can judge colors before continuing, and it improves adhesion for the next layer. Wipe off any excess so only a thin film remains.

Use it when: resuming work on a painting with patchy sheen.

29. Couching

Applying a thin layer of medium to a dry area and painting into it while wet. It is similar to oiling out but done specifically to make new paint flow and blend over a dry passage.

30. Retouch and Final Varnishing

A thin retouch varnish can be applied to a touch-dry painting to even out sheen temporarily. A final varnish is applied only after the painting has cured fully, commonly six months or more, to protect the surface and unify gloss. Varnish is removable by conservators, which separates the protective layer from the paint itself.

How These Techniques Combine in a Painting

Few paintings rely on one technique. A typical layered landscape might use an imprimatura, a brunaille underpainting, a lean block-in, blending in the sky, scumbling on distant hills, dry brush on the foreground, glazing in shadows and impasto in highlights. An alla prima portrait might use a toned ground, wiping out, direct blending, and a few impasto highlights.

Techniques That Need Drying Time vs Wet Techniques

A practical way to organize this list is by whether the paint underneath must be wet or dry. Wet techniques include alla prima, blending, wiping out, sgraffito and stippling into fresh paint. Dry-layer techniques include glazing, velatura, scumbling, dry brush over texture, oiling out and couching. Planning which group you need next tells you whether to keep painting today or let the surface set for a few days.

Which Techniques Should Beginners Learn First?

1. Imprimatura and simple underpainting
2. Fat over lean
3. Alla prima with blending
4. Dry brush and scumbling
5. Impasto for highlights
6. Glazing, once you are comfortable with drying times

Advanced techniques such as sfumato, complex indirect painting and velatura build on these foundations.

FAQs

What are the basic oil painting techniques?

The basics are toning the canvas, underpainting, alla prima, blending, fat over lean, glazing, scumbling, impasto and dry brush.

What is the difference between glazing and velatura?

Glazing uses fully transparent color over dry paint. Velatura uses a semi-opaque layer, often with a little white, to veil and soften what lies beneath.

What is the oldest oil painting technique?

Layered, indirect painting with underpainting and glazes is among the oldest, associated with early oil painters in the Low Countries in the fifteenth century.

Which technique gives oil paintings texture?

Impasto, palette knife painting, dry brush, sgraffito, stippling and cold wax all create texture.

Can I combine alla prima and glazing?

Yes. Many painters paint alla prima first, let it dry, then glaze selected areas to deepen color or unify the painting.

What technique makes oil paintings look realistic?

Realism depends mostly on accurate drawing, value control and edges, supported by underpainting, blending, glazing and careful color temperature.

Final Thoughts

This list of oil painting techniques covers preparation, application, layering, texture and design. Learning them in order, from toned grounds and underpainting to glazing and impasto, gives you a toolbox you can combine to suit any style or subject.

For a closer look at how advanced painters refine and combine these methods, explore our guide to professional-level oil painting techniques and workflows.