Paul George is a landscape artist from Massachusetts who shares oil and watercolor painting tutorials on Youtube. After reading about it on Laura’s Watercolors in early February, I tried his Essex Saltmarsh tutorial. It was fun, and I found I didn’t have to make that many color substitutions! I then looked up his video on his palette. I’ve done my best to recreate it from my collection below.
The colors (right to left):
- Raw Sienna (PY42 or PBr7) – I used Da Vinci in this paintout, but PG uses Winsor Newton, which is yellower. When painting from his tutorial, I found DS MANS a better replacement.
- Cadmium Yellow (PY35) – I used nontoxic Imidazolone Yellow (PY154).
- Aureolin (PY40) – This is a transparent mixing yellow, but it’s fugitive, so I used Nickel Azo Yellow (PY150).
- Cadmium Yellow Deep (PY35) – I used nontoxic Hansa Yellow Deep (PY65).
- Phthalo Green (PG7) – PG uses Winsor Green
- DS Quin Gold (PY150, PO48)
- DS Quin Rose (PV19)
- Phthalo Blue GS (PB15:3) – PG uses Winsor Blue
- Ultramarine Blue (PB29)
- Cobalt Turquoise (PG50)
- Cobalt Blue (PB28)
- Alizarin Crimson (PR83) – I used Da Vinci’s Alizarin Crimson Quinacridone (PV19), a permanent alternative
- DS Quin Sienna (PR209, PY150, PO48) – This is an intense-yet-earthy sunset orange mix of Quin Coral and Quin Gold (which is itself a mix of Nickel Azo Yellow and Quin Burnt Orange). It’s a lovely color; I don’t have the premix but I mixed my own. I prefer to have Quin Coral (PR209) in my palette as I can use it separately or in combination with the Quin Gold hue (or mix). I will also tend to use Transparent Red Oxide (PR101) in place of Quin Sienna for an earthy orange.
- Unknown Scarlet – PG appeared to have a scarlet here, so I put my DV Permanent Red (PR188), but he didn’t identify it so perhaps this was a mix (e.g. of Quin Rose and yellow).
- Unknown Earth – PG appeared to have a brown here, so I put DS Transparent Red Oxide (PR101) with a hint of Ultramarine to make it browner; again PG didn’t identify it, so it might have been a mix of other colors. PG seems to make browns from Quin Sienna + Ultramarine Blue, which is the way that I use Transparent Red Oxide.
Lessons
Understanding the teacher’s palette context can help to make wise substitutions in tutorials.
It was helpful to do this exercise to clarify how to do substitutions when doing George’s tutorials. Although I happened to have many of the colors already, I didn’t quite understand some aspects of George’s palette, such as the way he uses Quin Sienna in place of a traditional Burnt Sienna (or the way I use Transparent Red Oxide). Jumping into the saltmarsh tutorial without looking at George’s palette first, I struggled to make browns involving Ultramarine plus my three-pigment self-mix of ‘Quin Sienna’ (PR209 + PY150 + PO48). I could have just used Transparent Red Oxide in place of Quin Sienna to begin with and made it easy on myself; I simply didn’t realize that George doesn’t use another sienna and I thought that the brighter color was being used on purpose.
Cobalt Turquoise + warm yellow for bright, intense greens.
I’ve been hesitant to include Cobalt Turquoise in my landscapes because it makes such bright greens – neon, really, with a cool yellow such as Hansa Yellow Light. When making greens that are bright but still reasonable in a landscape context, I tend to go for Phthalo Green (PG7) + cool yellow. George’s approach for the very bright saltmarsh grass was to use Cobalt Turquoise + a slightly more muted yellow (Aureolin, but I used Nickel Azo Yellow). I think it worked really well! I’ve seen that South Shore saltmarsh grass in person and it really does have that eerie, bright, yellowy-yet-cool color.
Dark things reflect lighter, light things reflect darker.
This was a rule of thumb cited by George as a justification for making the mud appear lighter when reflected in the pond, but the sky darker. I’d never heard this before, and it’s a great one to remember.
I love a pink sky.
The totally pink sky isn’t super realistic (compared to the reference photo in the video), but just washing in some pink is how George does the sky, and I love it.
Interesting rule about reflections! Much more pithy than what I have been thinking, that is, something along the lines of “reflections lose value and color range”. (I guess the color of the water/bottom dulls all the reflected colors? Also most foliage seems to reflect warmer than in reality, at least in the water bodies I see.)
(I think about this because I am really attracted to scenes with reflections in them.)
…now I have tried my hand at this one, too, ans have a couple of thoughts:
— My greens are nowhere as vibrant as his, and I don’t think yours seem to be, either? That WN RS must be strong stuff. (I used DS PG50 and MARS.)
— I, too, like the pink sky here. It really brings out the green, which is, after all, the focus. I am tempted to say that this is one of those situations where choosing an ‘unrealistic’ color creates a more ‘realistic’ impression of how one’s eye might perceive a natural scene. Does that make sense? (I feel like this is something I want to think about more. I keep reading about color composition, but I don’t think about it much, apart from picking out limited palettes for paintings.)
I swatched out WN Raw Sienna from their dot card, and it’s a mix of PY42 and PR101 – looks like synthetic yellow ochre with a bit of Transparent Red Oxide mixed in. It’s definitely closer to Yellow Ochre (a warmer one like Holbein’s) than what I think of as Raw Sienna.
You’re totally right about the pink sky setting off the green! I also felt better about the realism of the pink sky a few days ago when I was out and sunset and noticed that a portion of the sky really did look that pink – at least for a band over the horizon to the east (away from the setting sun). It seemed to fade to a light gray and then cyan blue toward the zenith. I think of this as a “beach sunset” because I live in a place where you have to face east to look at the sea. I suppose that’s also likely the direction from which you’d be looking at a saltmarsh in Essex MA.
I read somewhere (handprint?) that the WN raw sienna is ‘close to the historical color’ (which makes sense given that it’s often included in green recipes). I am going to get some next time I come across some cheap WN!
And yeah, the east often has very interesting sunset colors!
Interesting observation about warmer colors in the reflections! I’m not sure if it’s the same phenomenon, but I also feel that foliage greens often look warmer when you stand directly below a tree and look up. The same leaves viewed from a distance appear cooler.