Chromium Oxide Green (PG17) is an extremely opaque, lightly granulating single-pigment dull green. It’s a nice color for desert plants, but not the only nice color, and I haven’t found another use for it. So, I’ve been wondering if I want to remove it from my extended palette. I sometimes feel when I’m making color spotlights that I accidentally mix a hue. So let’s try mixing a hue on purpose.
Paint
My New Gouache Theory: Base Colors & Mixing Colors
I have a new gouache theory.
When I first posted my gouache observations and palette, I noted that some of my favorite watercolor pigments – the transparent, high-tinting ones in the phthalo and quinacridone families – don’t always make good gouache, because gouache is meant to be opaque. Phthalo Green gouache, for example, while thicker and less transparent than the corresponding watercolor, still isn’t opaque, and when you paint it out it can appear patchy. My favorite gouache colors were opaque pigments with more robust coverage: colors like Titanium White (PW6) and Hansa Yellow Light (PY3).
I’ve come to realize, though, that there is still important value to those less-opaque colors, especially the ones with high tinting strength, because they can be great mixing colors. You just need to combine them with another color that has the desired opaque properties. You mix practically everything in gouache with at least a little white, anyway, so it’s not such a big deal that not every color has perfect coverage alone.
I now mentally divide my gouache palette into two categories: base colors and mixing colors.
What’s in my palette? (January 2024)
Now seems like a good time to review what’s in my palette. It’s been awhile – my last palette map was nearly a year ago, in March 2023. I keep swapping stuff in and out so much that I never feel it’s in a stable state, but you have to snapshot sometime.
Artist Palette Profiles: Joyce Hicks
I recently enjoyed reading Joyce Hicks’ Painting Beautiful Watercolor Landscapes: Transform Ordinary Places into Extraordinary Scenes (2014, North Light Books) and painted out a palette inspired by the one she describes in the book. Of all the palettes I’ve explored, I think this might the best one I have enjoyed the most and most wanted to emulate in my own painting!
Mix Your Own Alizarin Crimson Hue
Alizarin Crimson is a notoriously beautiful and fugitive pigment. Many people now use Quinacridone Rose (PV19), Carmine (PR176), or other alternatives, but the color is often pinker and not as deep. So how can we mix a hue?
While I don’t have the original Alizarin Crimson (PR83) to compare to, I’m using Da Vinci Alizarin Crimson Quinacridone (PV19) as a point of comparison (upper left).
Here’s what I came up with.
The Winter Palette, Mark II
Last year, I proposed a Winter Palette, and then I changed my mind about many of the colors after doing Lisa Spangler’s Nature Spot challenge. After a second round of Nature Spot challenge the following year, I have built a second iteration of the Winter Palette!
Mixing Mauve for Watercolor Clouds
Last time I looked at purple mixes, I fell most in love with the vibrant ones. Recently, though, in my efforts to make more subtle watercolor sky & sunset colors, I’ve been trying to find my favorite mixes for mauve, aka dull purple.
Artist Palette Profiles: Ron Ranson
I loved Ron Ranson On Skies (1996, Studio Vista), a book that mixes careful observation and teaching about cloud and sky natural history with practical painting techniques. Let’s see what colors Ranson used to paint skies!
The Paint Scoring List!
When deciding between paints, especially ones that I like equally well and that fill similar palette niches, I find it hard to juggle all the various factors to think about, many of which are not immediately obvious from first paintout: lightfastness, toxicity, drying shift, price series (cost), and tinting strength. That’s why I’ve come up with a needlessly complicated rating system!
Mixing Watercolor Greens for the Foliage of the Northeast, Season by Season
In choosing between different greens and green-mixing yellows for my main palette and for various seasonal palettes, I found myself making a gallery of foliage photos I’ve taken in different seasons, and I thought I’d share it with you! I took these photos mostly in eastern Massachusetts or the surrounding area; one is from Nova … Read more