Course options for beginner painters

Purchase the Beginner Course then upgrade to the Full Course when you are ready.

 

Beginner Course

 

Upgrade Package
 
  Work through the Beginner Course.... ...then upgrade to the
Full Course
 
 
 
25 Course units
75 Assignments
20 Workshop Video Lectures
One Year Full Membership
  • Online Campus
  • Free Monthly Updates
  • Member Newsletter
31 Course units
175 Assignments
   
   
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Beginner Course

The Beginner Course is a program of self-study art classes for beginners. You get 25 of the 56 art course units from the course Building Blocks of the Full Course, which give you all the basic foundation topics a beginner need to know about, whether your prefer to paint in oils, acrylics, watercolors or pastels. Once you have mastered the Beginner Course you can upgrade to the Full Course.

The Beginner Course includes all of the following:

25 Self-Study Painting Courses
 

Each course is in Adobe Reader PDF format (what is PDF?) so you can download and read them on your computer, or you can print them out on your home printer to use in your studio. You can put the printouts into a binder and if you get paint on a page, don't worry, unlike a book you can easily print out a clean copy!

The Beginner Course units include:

  • a step-by-step series of lessons and assignments to gradually build your foundation skills in painting, so you learn better and do not get frustrated by a lack of progress
  • all the important and useful information gathered over the years from the author's personal library of over a hundred art books
  • all the tips and tricks the author has learned during his years of study with master artists
     
 

Each painting course unit contains about 15 - 20 pages of information, and each lesson guides you through a specific topic, in a special easy-to-read proprietary format called Information Maps®.

75 Assignments
 

Each painting course unit contains four to ten learning assignments to help you practice and assimilate the information. If you follow them as directed you will soon notice a change in your art work.

20 Workshop Video Lectures
 

Week one and week two of my Workshop Video Lectures (20 in total), so you get exactly the same material I teach in my live workshops.

Online Campus
 

You have access to the Online Campus for one year, where you can upload your assignments and discuss your work with other students to comment, as well as display your art work for critique by other students. Working with other students can help get you motivated, and you will learn a lot from each other's efforts.

Free Monthly Course Updates

 

All updates to our course materials for a period of one year.

Which course units are included in the Beginner Course?

The Beginner Course gives you all the beginner painting course units from the 9 Virtual Art Academy® course Building Blocks - painting knowledge and techniques you won't find anywhere else. You will get all these painting lesson course units for oil painting, acrylic painting, and watercolor painting:
  Color Unit 1 - Key Concepts
  Color Unit 2 - Palettes and Basic Pigments
  Design & Composition Unit 1 - Space Division
  Drawing Unit 1 - Gesture
  Drawing Unit 2 - Accuracy
  Drawing Unit 3 - Contour
  Drawing Unit 4 - Putting It All Together
  Notan Unit 1 - Mass Notan 1
  Notan Unit 2 - Mass Notan 2
  Observation Unit 1 - Values
  Observation Unit 2 - Color
  Process Unit 1- Alla Prima Painting Process
  Process Unit 1- Watercolor Step-by-Step
  Process Unit 2 - Planning Your Learning Program
  Process Unit 3-1 - Paints & Pigments
  Process Unit 3-2 - Painting Supports
  Process Unit 4 - Studio Equipment
  Process Unit 6-1 - Plein Air Painting Equipment
  Process Unit 6-2 - Lightweight Painting Supports
  Visual Poetry & Music Unit 1 - The Visual Poetry & Music Model

What does it cost?

The Beginner Course is less than the cost of just a one week workshop with a professional artist that would cost you around US$2000 if you include the cost of tuition, travel and lodgings. Instead you get one year of self-study material instead of just one week's worth!

Many of my students have told me that this is the most thorough information they have found anywhere on the internet (read the emails that students have sent me over the past few years) so I will happily give you a 30-day Money Back Guarantee.

 
Purchase the US$199.95 Beginner Course

Click on the Buy Now button to see the price in your local currency.

 
 

  
Purchase the US$299.95 Upgrade Package

Click on the Buy Now button to see the price in your local currency.


 
2CO - 2CheckOut.com Inc. (Ohio, USA) is an authorized retailer for goods and services provided by
Virtual Art Academy®.

 

What happens after you click 'Buy Now'...

 
Enter your payment details

You will be redirected to our credit card payment site 2checkout.com (2CO) and asked for your billing details. You will see the cost in your own currency for your convenience.

Register your purchase

After you have filled out your details and the payment has processed, you will see our Registration page. Just complete the details, then check your email for a confirmation message.

Download your art course units

Once you have confirmed your registration we will email you the instructions for downloading the Beginner Course. Before you download your art course, make sure you have the latest version of Adobe Reader installed on your computer (to read the PDF files).

Upgrade Package

Once you have completed all the Beginner Course lessons, you can upgrade to the Full Course. Or, if you have already purchased the Beginner Course and find that you are more advanced than the level of material in the course, then get the Upgrade Package. By purchasing the Upgrade Package you will convert your complete Beginner Course into the Full Course.

Which course units are included in the Upgrade Package?

 

Course Unit

Beginner

+ Upgrade

= Full

Brushwork 1

 

yes

yes

Brushwork 2

 

yes

yes

Brushwork 3

 

yes

yes

Brushwork 4

 

yes

yes

Brushwork 5

 

yes

yes

Brushwork 6

 

yes

yes

Color 1

yes

 

yes

Color 2

yes

 

yes

Color 3

 

yes

yes

Color 4

 

yes

yes

Color 5

 

yes

yes

Color 6

 

yes

yes

Composition 1

yes

 

yes

Composition 2

 

yes

yes

Composition 3

 

yes

yes

Composition 4

 

yes

yes

Composition 5

 

yes

yes

Composition 6

 

yes

yes

Drawing 1

yes

 

yes

Drawing 2

yes

 

yes

Drawing 3

yes

 

yes

Drawing 4

yes

 

yes

Drawing 5

 

yes

yes

Drawing 6

 

yes

yes

Form 1

 

yes

yes

Form 2

 

yes

yes

Form 3

 

yes

yes

Notan 1

yes

 

yes

Notan 2

yes

 

yes

Notan 3

 

yes

yes

Notan 4

 

yes

yes

Notan 5

 

yes

yes

Notan 6

 

yes

yes

Observation 1

yes

 

yes

Observation 2

yes

 

yes

Observation 3

 

yes

yes

Observation 4

 

yes

yes

Observation 5

 

yes

yes

Observation 6

 

yes

yes

Process 1
(Oils & Acrylics)

yes

 

yes

Process 1
(Watercolors)

yes

 

yes

Process 2

yes

  

yes

Process 3-1
(Oils)

yes

 

yes

Process 3-1
(Acrylics)

yes

 

yes

Process 3
(Watercolors)

yes

 

yes

Process 3-2
(Oils/Acrylics)

yes

 

yes

Process 4
(Oils)

yes

 

yes

Process 4
(Acrylics)

yes

 

yes

Process 4
(Watercolors)

yes

 

yes

Process 5

 

yes

yes

Process 6-1
(Oils/Acrylics)

yes

 

yes

Process 6-2
(Oils/Acrylics)

yes

 

yes

Process 6
(Watercolors)

yes

 

yes

Visual Poetry & Music 1

yes

 

yes

Visual Poetry & Music 2

 

yes

yes

Visual Poetry & Music 3

 

yes

yes

 

 
Purchase the US$299.95 Upgrade Package

Click on the Buy Now button to see the price in your local currency.


2CO - 2CheckOut.com Inc. (Ohio, USA) is an authorized retailer for goods and services provided by Virtual Art Academy®.
 

Note: This option is only for those students who have purchased the Beginner Course. This table shows which course units you get in each of the three packages.

What students say about the Beginner course

"In my opinion, your material is the best I have found. It builds the basics, from the ground up, recognizing that there are no short cuts.....Your course puts all the right info into one package, and even more important, it gives me an organized, building block way to get these things into my head, and I have already noticed an improvement in my work." .........George, USA, May, 2009

"I want to tell you that I am really glad to have bought your learning program. I already benefit from it after only a few weeks of reading and exercising, although I am an absolute beginner and have to translate everything into German." .........Angelika, Germany, September, 2008

"The video explanations were simple to understand, with visuals provided concurrently with the explanations. It was just like attending a live lecture in an art school!. The written notes and the assignments also helped to reinforce what I learnt from the video lectures." .........Ching, USA, October, 2008

"I love the program and have printed out everything. WHEW! There's a lot of information there. I now have 3 very large binders (Beginners Course and the Drawing Course) of information and lessons to go through. I'm going through them page by page and practicing what is taught. I truly appreciate the way in which it's written. It's very easy to understand and if I do have a problem, I know where to go to get any answers. Thanks again and I look forward to learning more from your program." .........Christie, USA, August, 2009

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