Welcome to another installment of ASK PLAIDIE LADDIE!

Plaidie Laddie, loyal Plaid pooch and one of our blog contributors, wants to answer your most burning painting questions. Every week he’ll pick a question out of his virtual mailbag and answer it (with a little help from me, since he only has paws). This week’s question:

“Dear Plaidie Laddie, I’m about do a painted project with a nature scene and I’m wondering if you have advice on how I can paint clouds.  I want them to look natural and a regular flat brush doesn’t get me the look that want.  Can you help?” -Suzi C. from California

Dear Suzi!  Never fear, I’ve got the solution to your problem.  I’ve asked one of our resident experts, Plaid designer Julie Lewis, how she does her painted clouds and gets them to look so natural.  Her solution is to use a stencil brush!  Let’s illustrate with blue paint so that you can really see how it works.

Use a stencil brush that fits the size of your clouds – use a smaller brush for smaller clouds and a larger brush for larger ones.  Dip your brush into the paint puddle lightly (don’t cover the brush) and then “pounce” the stencil brush up and down on the side to tap off some of the paint.  You want the brush nearly dry when you are doing this technique.

Lightly swirl the brush on your surface.  Keep adding paint, tapping it off and then swirling again.  Use less paint for more whisp-y clouds.

Yay, loook at the pretty clouds!  They will look fantastic in white, don’t you think?

Sincerely, Plaidie Laddie