Painting with Painter's Oil, Acrylic, & Impasto Brushes

Painter has three categories of brushes that put down paint in emulation of real world acrylic and oil paints: Oil, Acrylic, and Impasto brushes.

Painter also has two other brush categories useful for working with Oil/Acrylic/Impasto: Blender and Palette Knife brushes.

Painting with the Oils Brushes

"Thick" brushes are also Impastos

Four subsets within oils:

Bristle (21) - which is controlled in the Real Bristle panel, but has the Real Bristle check box turned off
Static Bristle (2)
Real Bristle (13) - which is a checkbox in the Real Bristle control panel
And other (7) - 42 total

Bristles, Static Bristles, and Real Bristles all have "hairs" you can see in the brushstrokes. They each have a separate control panel in the

Bristles show clear, thin, individual hairs in the brush. Counter-intuitively, the larger the number in the "Features" settings, the fewer hairs in the brush. They're good at giving a soft but textured feel to a painted stroke

Note that Real Bristle is turned off

Real Bristles (Brushes that start with "Real") try to emulate the physical behavior of brush hairs. When on (you can turn it off in the Brush Controls panel), they have a distinct "feel" when dropping the brush onto the canvas and lifting it away. They're good at expressing gestures with paint for a lively brushstroke.

Static Bristles can have their hair size (scale) changed. They're good for thick, clumpy, painted strokes with lots of texture.

Impastos

Impasto brushes put three dimensional paint on the canvas surface. This can create a painting with a more realistic texture.

Impasto: Grainy Impasto

Impasto brushes paint strokes of thick paint with realistic highlights and shadows
Light pressure lays down thick paint
Heavy pressure digs into existing paint
Adjust lighting in the Canvas > Surface Lighting menu

Adjust impasto thickness with Impasto brush controls

Impasto: Grainy Impasto

Acrylics

An odd collection, somewhat arbitrary. Has some impasto brushes in it (Bristle Brush, and Thick Acrylics). To me, there is no perceptible advantage over Oil brushes or Impasto brushes

Mixing color with blender brushes

Blending might be the best thing about oils. By their nature, they stay wet for a long time and can be easily blended into smooth gradients of color. Some of the best blending tools in Painter use the Artist's Oils Dab Type:

Blended with Blender: Grainy Blender to reveal the grain of the canvas/paper

These are the Blender Brushes use Artist's Oils dab type:

Blenders: Blender Bristle
Blenders: Blender Brush
Blenders: Grainy Blender
Blenders: Real Blender Flat
Blenders: Real Blender Round

Blenders: Real Blender Tapered
Blenders: Mixer Thin Flat
Blenders: Soft Blender Brush
Blenders: Wet Oily Blender

Note that, except for Grainly Blender and Real Blender Flat, all Artist's Oil Blenders are loaded with paint when you first touch them down, and so become a way of blending the current color into what's already painted on the canvas