Even if painting fruit is not your first desire, all artists should at least try it. Painting still life is a great way to practice shading and color blending.

Whenever you are painting still life, it is a good idea to first cover your canvas with paint before hand and let it dry completely. The color you use is really up to you. This will be the background so make if interesting. I like an abstract kind of look with long random strokes. I would recommend a raw sienna or orange color with the center of the canvas brighter. Use an inexpensive brand for this purpose.

Set up your still life of fruit. Working from a photo is fine, but you will get truer shades and reflections from real life. Now roughly sketch in the fruit. Start noticing on the fruit the portions that are catching the light. Also look closely and the colors that you are seeing. If you look closely you will see purples in apples, greens and browns in bananas and even blues in reflected light. You are not ready for painting them in yet, but should be aware of all of these things. Take your time and get the sketch accurate. You may even decide to do some rearranging.

Now you are ready to under paint the fruit. Under painting is the first layer. If you are painting red apples, choose a dark red and fill in the entire fruit. Do each subject this way.

Next you will start to add shades. Decide where the darkest areas are in the fruit and with a clean brush paint them in. Do not worry about blending or making it look real yet. The darkest areas will be near the base and on the side that is away from the light source. If your shades are darker than the actual fruit don’t worry this is probably going to make the painting more dramatic.

Now you are ready to add the lighter values. Take the original color of the fruit that you used and lighten it up a bit with white. Now you have a highlight color. With a clean and smaller brush, start applying the highlight while blending them into the main color and shadow color.

The last steps are to take yet smaller brushes and add some even brighter highlights to the spots that are sparkling with reflected light. You may want to exaggerate the shadows and dark areas as well. Stand back and view your painting. You will be amazed at how a few small details will bring the piece alive. For example, those little dark edges on bananas and the stem of the apples. Be careful not to over do it though. Have fun and don’t forget to sign your painting.