Painting A Shiny Balloon

For Our Son's Birthday

I was so excited to paint this balloon for our son's 7th birthday. The shiny texture has always intrigued me. I knew I wanted to do a gold balloon so I could try out my Gamblin gold metallic paint for the dark areas. It was so fun to play around with colour in this piece. He asked for a pinky, purple background and I found this great reference photo on Canva. Mixing the pigments for this was eye opening. There are so many colours I never imagined would be in it. I definitely want to do more balloons in the future.

How Long Do These Paintings Take?

I was asked the other day how long these mini paintings take. Between the sketching, colour mixing, painting, and filming it takes 4-8 hours per piece. I love being able to share all my steps online with you. I've always wanted to learn more about time lapse photography and video editing too. So recording all these steps has been a fun challenge.

The Palette & Piece

Here's a little look at the palette of colours I mixed before starting. I love how long oil paint takes to dry. It gives me space to mix these colours the day before. I like to premix the colours so I can spend the next day just focused on painting. I only get so many hours while our son is in school. This assures I get to fully enjoy the flow state while he's gone.