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Planets Painting 

Learn how to create your own planets painting step by step with acrylic on canvas!

I did this on an 8 x 10 stretched canvas and an 11 x 14 stretched canvas with acrylic paints. 

You can do this on any size or surface!

This tutorial will show you specifically how to paint planets on an already painted galaxy background. 

If you would like to learn how to paint this lovely galaxy background, head on over to my how to paint a galaxy tutorial!

See also:

Materials:

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Yield: One 8 x 10 canvas

How To Paint Planets

Print

Learn how to paint planets on a galaxy painted background with acrylics.

Active Time 1 hour

Total Time 1 hour

Difficulty Easy

Materials

• Chalk (for drawing planets)
• Acrylic Paints
• Brushes

Colors

• Light Green Permanent
• Titanium White
• Mars Black 
• Quinacridone Magenta 
• Neutral Gray Value 5
• Naples Yellow 

Brushes

• 1/4” Flat (12 bright)
• 4 Round brush (or similar size) 

Instructions

1. Draw the planets with your chalk onto the dried galaxy background.
2. Paint the first planet by whiting it out with titanium white. Wait for the white to dry.
3. Paint a blend of white, light green permanent and black to create the ecliped planet.
4. Continue on to the next planets by painting them white first and then applying the color.
5. Shade the planets with black and white.
6. To do Saturn, paint it white first and then Naples yellow. Paint the rings with a smaller brush and gray blended with black.
7. Paint smaller planets way in the distance by painting smaller circles with your round brush.

Directions At A Glance:

How To Paint Planets Video:

Step By Step Photos: 

Note: the picture directions below are slightly different than the video. For example, I did not white the planets out first in the picture directions. 

1. Draw out your planets with chalk. 

I drew out a simple composition of planets with chalk. Note that the chalk will erase as you paint the planets in.

The eclipsed one on the lower left is only half visible so I only drew a half a circle.

2. Paint your planets in! 

One thing I recommend is to white the planets out first. That means painting the shape white first and then the color so your color shows up nice and bright against the black. 

Note that I did not do the whiting out thing in the picture directions. 

Start with light green permanent and paint the shape in.

Then blend the white with the green on the far right of the shape so it looks like it is brighter in that area.

Then create the darker eclipsed area by blending black in with the light green permanent. 

3. Paint the upper right planet quinacridone magenta + white!

Since quinacridone magenta is translucent, I added white to it.

Then use black for the shadow on the left and white for the highlight on the right.

Blend the black with the rest of the color.

4. Continue on painting in your planets! 

My gray one got kind of “lumpy” here. Maybe it’s a meteor!

Any how, I used “neutral gray” for that gray planet. Then I did the shading thing with mars black. 

I also painted the smaller planets in. Use a smaller round brush for the smaller planets.

5. Paint Saturn

I started by filing the entire circle in with naples yellow.

Then I painted gray stripes over the yellow.

After that, I did the black shadow line on the far left. 

6. Saturn’s Rings

For the rings I used a 1/8″ flat brush and titanium white.

Part of the ring is thicker on the left and right side. Then the ring gets thinner in the front part that overlaps Saturn. 

To darken the ring, I painted black lines along the ring using a small #1 round brush (any small round brush will do).

That’s it!

See Also Glow In The Dark Galaxy Planet Painting Tutorial:

Share! Let’s see those Galaxy Space paintings!!!

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