This is the definitive practical guide for beginners to painting in all the most popular media - watercolour, oils and acrylics - written by popular TV artist and author Alwyn Crawshaw. A comprehensive, practical course, it encapsulates 50 years' worth of painting and teaching in one volume.

This book brings together Alwyn's wealth of experience in teaching beginners to paint. He begins with the absolute basics - making a start, keeping things simple, and learning to judge when a painting is finished. He shows how to choose the best medium for different subjects, explaining how the different surfaces affect your work and which brushes and colours to use, and teaches the fundamentals of simple perspective, colour mixing, composition and tonal values.

Alwyn then takes you by the hand and starts you off with simple three-colour exercises. He also shows how to work from photographs, and includes a helpful section on painting outdoors and working from a sketch. This is followed by a number of half-hour exercises, which are a particularly useful learning tool. The rest of the book contains more than 20 step-by-step demonstrations in watercolour, acrylics and oils, featuring landscapes, seascapes and figures.