Hold that Zebra! Now Paint!

Are you running out of ideas for zebra paintings? Try this simple approach. Paint a pattern of zebra stripes without painting the entire zebra. You could paint one of its eyes, an ear, a nostril near the jaw, and so on. You could paint the tail flapping over its right or left side. The choice is up to you.

As an example for this article, let's take just a section of one of the sides as your guide using acrylic paint. This may sound silly yet simple, so go ahead and paint your canvas -- white. Paint over the canvas layering on the paint sort of thick. Before it dries, take hold of a palette knife so that you can scribe in the lines of fur. Take the extra time to make it look like fur. Once this is done you are over the most difficult part of the painting.

Allow the paint plenty of time to dry before you apply the black paint. Once the white paint has dried, use a 6H pencil to carefully and lightly draw in the outlines of each stripe. It is okay if you make a mistake. An acrylic eraser will get rid of them. Just do not rub too hard with it.

Use either a narrow flat or small angle sable brush for better control. Paint along the edges filing in the gaps of the fur. It is okay for a streak of it to go out of the lines as long as it is not too far out. You may find that you need to paint back over certain areas. Hold out or step away from the painting to see if your stripes need more attention.

Here is where the fun comes into play. Use the finest round brush you have to paint in the black fur. Paint in the appearance of fur by ever so slightly taking tiny bits of black streaks partially out of the black stripes. You do not want it too noticeable, but just enough for when you get up close and personal with the painting.

You should now have a pretty good representation of zebra stripes appear. Not too shabby for a simple guide such as this to walk you through this painting process. Go ahead and try your hand at painting a hoof or both eyes. The ideas are endless in ways to paint part of a zebra.