I love the night sky, and there’s not much that’s more beautiful than a big bright moon. Heck, I’ll even settle for a half moon or a crescent moon! So in honor of the moon and all its beauty, I wanted to show you how you can use acrylic pouring to create an amazing moon painting. This tutorial is great for beginners, as I’ll go through three different methods of creating a moon painting step-by-step and with a video of each.
If you’re into painting the moon, you might also be into my galaxy paintings as well, so check those out!
So how do you make a moon painting? Well, the three methods of creating a moon painting that I will be going through step by step are:
- Swipe
- Flip-cup pour
- Dirty-cup pour
If you’re pouring for the first time and would like more explanation on materials, processes, and terms, you can head on over to my Beginner’s Guide to Acrylic Pouring. You can also head over to my Comprehensive Guide to Acrylic Pouring Techniques for more information on all of the different techniques.
What colors do you need to make a moon painting?
I used three colors for painting the moon; that’s it. I used silver (which you’ll see below I switched between paintings due to my supplies running low), white, and black. You’ll want to be sure that the main color you are working with is white, though, lest the black and silver, especially the black, take over your painting.
(If you’re curious about colors and color theory as it relates to acrylic pouring, head on over to my post about Choosing Colors for Acrylic Pouring and grab your FREE printable Color Wheel and Color Scheme Guides.)
I chose to paint just the moon and the night sky in these, but you could add anything you wanted for embellishment, like a landscape, a wolf, a woman, a tree, etc. The sky’s the limit! Or you could incorporate other colors into it if you wanted, like for a blue moon or a yellow moon painting. Acrylic pouring is so flexible that you can customize it to suit you and your home quite easily!
Materials You Will Need to Paint a Moon with Acrylic Pouring:
Paints:
- Master’s Touch Permanent Black
- Artist’s Loft Titanium White
- Artist’s Loft Silver
- DecoArt Dazzling Metallics Shimmering Silver
Medium:
- Floetrol
- Water
Canvas:
- 8in x 10in canvas (for the swipe and the flip-cup)
- Round wood board sourced from Home Depot
Tools:
- Baby wipe/wet paper towel
- Torch (optional)
How to Paint a Moon Painting Method 1: Swipe
- First, lay down your white paint in the area where you want your moon to be. You’ll want most of the moon area covered in white, if not all of it.
- Next put down some silver on top of the white paint.
- Last, drop on some black. Be very sparing with your black. I put it just in dots on the moon in hopes that it would encourage areas that looked like craters.
- Next, pour a line of white paint along one of the edges of the moon.
- Using a baby wipe or wet papertowel, drag a thin layer of the line of white paint over the rest of your moon, swiping in a curved motion.
- Tilt your moon until you like the look of it. Don’t worry about it being a perfect circle right now as you will clean that up later.
- Don’t be afraid to go in with a pallet knife or a popsicle stick and adjust things, fix things, get lumps out, whatever. Most things that happen that you don’t like are totally fixable!!
- Once your moon is dry to the touch (Don’t rush it!! I know it’s tempting!), go in with a flat brush and paint your night sky in. (See the next technique for what to do if you’re not confident about getting a good circle shape!)
- Using silver (you could also use white like I did with my galaxy paintings), flick some paint from the end of a small brush to add some stars.
- Dot in any stars that you want bigger or in a particular place.
How to Paint a Moon Painting Method 2: Flip-cup Pour
- Pour paint into cup to be flipped. The order I added paint was white, silver, and a smidge of black. The majority of my paint was white.
- Depending on how your paint mixed when you poured it into the cup, give it a slight stir to promote cells, since we won’t be stretching this across the whole canvas.
- Put your canvas facedown on top of your cup and flip them as one.
- Allow the paint time to settle onto the canvas.
- Remove your cup
- Tilt the canvas until you are happy with the outcome. Again, don’t worry about it being perfectly round because we will fix this later.
- Again, don’t be afraid to go in with a pallet knife or a popsicle stick and adjust things, fix things, get lumps out, whatever. It’s worth saying again that most things that happen that you don’t like are totally fixable!!
- Once again, when your moon is dry to the touch (Don’t rush it!! I know it’s tempting!), grab something round and place it where you would like your moon to be. I used a cottage cheese lid; you could use a cup, bowl, plate, whatever works for the size that you’re working with. Get creative!
- Go in with a flat brush and paint your night sky in.
- With a small brush, sketch in lines of silver around your moon for radiating light.
- Soften those silver lines with black if they are too bold.
- Using silver (you could also use white like I did with my galaxy paintings), flick some paint from the end of a small brush to add some stars.
NOTES:
- There are a couple things that can happen if you choose to only pour on part of the canvas like I did:
- The thickness of the paint from the moon that you paint over will be visible in your night sky. I didn’t mind this because I used the silver to create the effect of radiating light anyway.
- The paint may be thicker in certain areas than others depending oun how you stretch the paint. This can cause there to be areas of relief in your moon. I also did not mind this because it’s the moon…there are creaters. But still something to be mindful of depending on the look you are going for in your painting.
How to Paint a Moon Painting Method 3: Dirty-cup Pour
- Lay down a base coat of white paint and spread it out evenly on your canvas/wood.
- Fill the cup for your pour. The order that I poured my paints into the cup was: white, silver, white, black, white, silver, white. Again, keep white as your main color to avoid black overtaking the whole thing.
- I used two 9-ounce cups on this wood circle, which you can find the dimensions for in the product link above. You can pour these simultaneously or one after the other, which is what I did.
- Tilt your pour until you’re happy with the outcome.
- Torch to encourage cells if you’d like.
NOTES:
I just wanted to share that this wood is soft! So be careful if you’re doing any scraping on it.
I did a previous pour and wasn’t a fan, so I did a base coat of white on it to prepare for the moon painting. I attempted my moon but hadn’t mixed my paints well enough, so it was gross and clumpy. So I took it outside to wash it off with the hose. In Arizona, that is the equivalent of throwing boiling water on it.
My base coat pealed off, so I scraped the remaining paint off. But I wasn’t very careful, so I did end up with some gouges and marks in it. I still love my moon though and am going to make an outdoor table out if it, so I’m going to resin it, and it should all even out.
Also, a good tip is to screw three or four screws into the bottom of the wood to act as feet, comes in super handy for holding it while you’re tilting your pour. Just make sure it’s level before you begin!
Go Forth and Pour!
Now you have your very own ode to the moon!! How easy was that! I just think acrylic pouring is the most awesome way to paint the moon because it naturally lends itself to a reasonably realistic rendering of the moon because the cells that you can create are reminiscent of craters. And it’s INFINITELY EASIER AND FASTER than sponge painting the moon (or anything else for that matter)!!
As always, check out my updates on Facebook and Instagram and feel free to peruse Homebody Hall for more fluid art tips, tricks, and tutorials! Also head over to Youtube and subscribe to get my videos sent to you as soon as they come out!!
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How to Paint Snow with Acrylic Pouring
Want to remember how to paint a moon painting later? Be sure to pin this tutorial to your favorite Pinterest board!
