Warning: Technical “artist ramblings.” Today I’ll discuss #paintsets and why I don’t (usually) use them. A while back I decided to give a “landscape” color kit from #wiliamsburgpaints a try with some frustration. I gave the set another go today with more (expected) frustration. Williamsburg makes some wonderful custom colors, but this particular set wasn’t working for me. I decided to break the set pigments down to identify potential problems. Pigments are usually printed on paint tubes. “Custom” colors are a result of combining “basic” pigments. The customized paints in this set are Stil de Grain, French Ardoise Grey (Slate), Courbet Green, Brilliant Yellow Pale, and King’s Blue. The photos show the contained pigments, which altogether are Arylide Yellow, Hansa Yellow, Hansa Deep, Yellow Iron Oxide, Prussian Blue, Phthalo Blue, Ultramarine Blue, Slate Balck (greenish-blue) and what looks to be Pyrazo Quinazo (light red with good tint strength). With all of these colors I should be able to do quite a lot. But, the pre-mixing of the colors favors certain colors over others and I can’t adjust that. The red is included in the Courbet Green, which is a beautifully dark high tint green. The Brilliant Pale Yellow might work well on it’s own, but it had low tinting strength with a combo of Arylide and Hansa and a bunch of white. The King’s Blue is basically a Cobalt Hue with additional white and not a lot of tint strength. The Yellow Iron Oxide (Still de Grain) was my only hope of achieving yellow-green colors, but would lose intensity when mixed with the King’s Blue. In this set the palette is overwhelmingly greenish-blue with Prussian and Phthalo blues dominating. Sets can be a great learning tool. I feel it’s necessary, though, to understand beforehand that sets don’t offer the flexibility that can be achieved with colors that are usually already found in an artists standard stock, they just offer convenience. If you’d like to explore pigments in more depth, check out ART IS CREATION at www.artiscreation.com (at Cape Town Southern Suburbs, Cape Town) https://www.instagram.com/p/CFkMgDSAI7f/?igshid=uujfco5mzaqc
