Oil painting is the process of painting in which drying oils (usually linseed oil) is used as the medium. It is the process of painting with pigments with a medium of drying oils as the binder. It has been the most common technique for painting on primarily canvas as well as wood panels for a considerable number of centuries, beginning in Europe and spreading throughout Asia, America and the rest of the world. Oil paint consists of a pigment and a resin in a solvent thinner and when the thinner evaporates, the resin forms a hard coating. The advantages of oil for painting on canvas or any other durable surface that has been carefully prepared include denser and richer colors, ease in applying multiple layers of paint, a broad tonal range and shades of colors and flexibility in covering vast spaces on the picture plane. However, working with oil paint is a very slow process especially because every layer of paint must be allowed to dry prior to applying another layer.