Painting palm trees is relaxing and fun and shouldn’t intimidate anyone.  We teach palm trees all the time in our summer paintings. We even teach it to our kids in our after school classes as well as our summer camps as anyone, young or seasoned can make the palm tree easily!

We actually created some little tiny paintings on small canvases with Palm trees during our summer art camp this week, which we used a different brush than the one we use when we create larger palm trees, but the tiny palm trees turned out fantastic too!!!  Palm trees and sunsets look fantastic in any color as seen in these.

Don’t Be Afraid

I think the reason why people are afraid of painting palm trees is getting the skinny, wispy lines to look realistic.  You may be asking yourself ”what is the right brush to use to make palm trees?”  Today I am going to show you.

Rake Brushes Are Magic

One brush that we love to use is a rake brush. We use the Qualita Golden Taklon Short Handle rake brush as it has a very nice jagged edge. We use this for a lot of things such as grass and feathers as well as using it for palm leaves. These brushes are fantastic however you can make your own instead of purchasing one by cutting up into a flat brush to make it jagged.

Starting with the Trunk

When you are starting to make a palm tree, you first need to use a flat brush or an angle brush about a half inch or smaller.  You will grab some black paint (we useGesso)and add a little bit of water (water is key) and will make the thin trunk.  Remember you can always make a trunk thicker, but it is hard to make it thinner. Some trunks are straight while others curve or bend in the wind.  You can also wiggle your hand slightly as you make the trunk so it is not straight and more natural.

Bountiful Branches

Once you have your trunk in, you are going to move to your rake brush.  You will still be using the black paint mixed with a little water which is extremely important! You always want to use your rake brush with the skinny part to make the initial branch. You will use your rake brush to make your palm branches bursting out from your trunk like a pinwheel or firework.  This burst of branches does not have to be symmetrical as nature is sometimes very random.

Next, you will use the wide part of the rake brush and simply pull in a downward slightly curved motion but you must lift off to get the fanning of the leaves. And so we’ll do this over and over again making sure to say as you make your branches LIFT OFF LIFT OFF LIFT OFF.   We feel that if you constantly say this as you are creating, it helps you with the light touch and the motion.  We tend to rotate our canvas as we are creating the palm leaves but whatever makes you most comfortable.

Practice Practice Practice

With everything, practicing this technique will make your palm trees easy and effortless to create in all of your paintings.  You can practice this motion on canvas, paper, or any surface to perfect the lifting off but remember that adding a little bit of water (not so your paint is dripping) will make the finished look that much easier!!!   Watch the video below as we show you this technique in more details.