My Palette Choices

My current selection

My palette this year has been fairly varied between the beginning of the year until now :-)

At the start, I chose my colors based on company paint discriptions from Handprint, a few glowing reviews in blogs, and gleaned info from the Wetcanvas forums; all with the intention that they should be as transparent as possible, single pigment, and light-fast.

The original well-worn crew: Pyrrol Red PR254, Azo Yellow PY151, Phthalo Green (YS) PG36, and Phthalo Blue (RS) PB15:0, Burnt Umber PBr7

Later I realized that it was a bit difficult to mix the delicate colors of Wisteria, so I went to the store to pick up a Quin magenta PV19 (and less interestingly a titanium white gouache) and accidentally wound up picking up a Cobalt Violet PV14 instead! Thus I was introduced to the wonderful world of granulation, even though I didn't know what to do with it at the time :-)

After a bit, I had a sort of falling-out with transparent watercolors because of their difficulty, so I switched to body color gouache, another limited palette again, based around a psuedo-zorn Palette.

A pic of the gouache colors when I got them

A few months with that, and I was once again convinced that I thoroughly appreciated the transparent watercolor glow, and that gouache wouldn't do for being so flat.

By this time I had decided I wasn't the biggest fan of M. Graham colors simply because of the excessive honey content, and that I'd like to look for something else. I also had a better idea of what characteristics I wanted in watercolors. I chose a core palette based on a thread here* in Wetcanvas. Later adding; Holbien's antique turquoise for a non-granulating convenience match with manganese blue, and phthalo green for an easy near black mixed with Quin violet(as a side note I find pthalo green good for very little else :-P).

Transparent side of the new palette: transparent pyrrol orange PO71, hansa yellow medium PY97, pthalo blue (RS) PB15:6, antique turquoise PB17, quinacridone violet PV19, phthalo green (YS) PG36

Further expanding my palate, I decided on a granulating group, as I come to thoroughly appreciate the textures attainable with these colors :-)

Rhodonite genuine, transparent red oxide PR101, goethite PY43, green apatite genuine, cobalt violet PV14, buff titanium PW6:1, burnt umber PBr7, manganese blue PB33

As my palette continues to expand, I can tell I'm probably finished generally with expanding the transparent non-granulating side of my palette, however I continue to look to aquire new granulating colors :-) You'll see in the pic at the top of my page I still keep a titanium white gouache(lovely for highlights), as well as an ivory black. I'm looking to replace the ivory black at some point. I rather wonder what the palette will look like in a year's time :-)