Gamblin Paints

I added a link to Gamblin because 1. They offer some nice modern organics at a reasonable price and 2. They address some aspect of Munsell.

The problem here is that their Munsell notations are just approximate. Also, they muddle them up with the terms warm and cool instead of neutral vs. chromatic. Warm and cool are too vague to be of much use to the painter.

the Ultimate Colorist Palette

Now, I hate the dichotomy imposed that distinguishes the righteous colorists from the stale tonalist painters. It is, rather, an outlook in my opinion; that is, what aspect of nature moves one painter versus another is a matter of taste. Its personal.
One can either pursue nature, try to reproduce it fully, or alter its appearance in some way. A colorist, at least in the impressionist sense of the word, replaces the actual appearance of nature with his or he subjective style, changing this or that, limiting values and enhancing reflections. Most keep their chromas rather low, like Monet. Others, like Soralla, seem to heighten their chromas a lot more. For me, nature is the utmost guide. But I do change the appearance of things to fit my artistic outlook as well.

That said, the following palette represents the full gamut of paint. (only around 17 pigments ) All, and I mean all miracles, styles, of any outlook can be achieved with this palette since it represents painted color space. Now, its not a palette of convenience. One can add anything else for ease of mixing. But to subtract any of this is to compromise, for the most part, what can be painted.

The Rational Color blog, which I hope will become a separate forum, was created to expand and better understand this range in order to revive art training, obviate nonsense and irrationality in the contemporary art world, and grow the possibilities of oil paint as an expressive and considered medium.

The Gamut of Oil Paint Palette.

Napthol Red
Perylene Red
Cadmium Orange
Hansa Yellow Medium
Hansa Yellow Light or Cadmium Lemon (Yellow Light) (Note these seem interchangeable)
Pthalo Green (Yellow Shade)
Pthalo Blue
Manganese Blue (Genuine) (occasional and only for one hue)
Ultramarine Blue
Diox Purple
Manganese Purple
Quinacridone Rose

Alizarin Crimson permanent (the single pigment variety made by Windsor and Newton) or
Pyrrol Ruby (a good replacement for the above )
Burnt Sienna ( for extra chroma in the YR range)
Burnt Umber
Ivory Black (this is the darkest value available in paint)
Titanium White (this is the lightest value available in paint)

One can see if the following help in rare occasions:
Pthalo Blue (red or green shades)
Phthalo Green (green shade)

The red shade seemed to make little difference when I tried it.

Color Wheel ...work in progress

(Sorry if this appears twice...blogger had an error and wouldn't publish the first one...says it's a draft in post listings. Hopefully I can remember what I wrote the first time!)

Here is the latest version of my color wheel.

I've added the 2.5 and 7.5 chips, as well as, the Munsell chips - trying to see where I'm off. I'll have to re-do a few. One of the purples dried too light and one of the greens doesn't look right here...maybe I picked up the wrong chips - or actually maybe I just didn't hit the target! One of the RP is 3/8 instead of the full chroma...don't know how that happened!

I really wish I had mixed enough of these to tube!!! Then that would be over. However, I did write on the back of each chip it's Munsell notation and the pigments used. (also on paper)

The chips inside the circle are pigments straight from the tube, with a bit of white added for darker colors. They are placed at random, but close to their families. I'll check all of them with the Munsell Book and find their correct placement later, as well as notate everything on the board.

Any advise???

For those of you attempting this project...keep working...it's an eye opening experience to say the least!

(When I see this wheel from a distance is nearly moves...vibrates like it's going to whirl off!)

No Hurt Feelings.

This Blog was created to discuss Ideas. An idea about color should rest on its own merit and be provable. We should maintain the highest standards of critical thinking, since, after all, we want to learn and improve. Argumentation, the discourse to achieve this goal, is not about posturing or name calling, but about reasoning.

Other Color Methods. Controlled Palettes of the Past, Etc.

Post other palettes here.

Another way to say "apple".

On the left, shadows were created with sap green with the cadmium red medium local color of the ball. Highlights were created with white. At right, the same ball shadowed with alizarin crimson and manganese violet, and highlighted analogously with cadmium red light, cadmium orange and white.

Something I came across while reading:

"Back in the nineteenth century, artists were just beginning to become acquainted with the bright, bold colors handed to them by the new science of pigment chemistry. The Impressionists began to experiment with new ways of portraying color and light. Here's our painterly colorist contemplating his apple: "Why darken that apple across the color wheel toward it's complement, leaving me with dull and lifeless neutrals, when by moving around the color wheel, I can achieve a shadowed value while maintaining vibrant color (chroma) ?"

Starting with local color, say cadmium red medium, our Impressionist grabs his brush and begins to darken it with..alizarin crimson! Even darker with manganese violet! Encouraged now, the artist highlights the opposite side with cadmium red light, cadmium orange, and cadmium yellow. Suddenly that apple explodes with color."

I really felt this was somewhat of an example of a painter trying to maintain high chroma in their painting. They were tired of dark, old pictures. This artist was not using strings of chroma of a single hue, as Graydon teaches us, but, he was thinking.

I was wondering if we could post pictures that show how we used to paint with color strings, and then the same object done in string chromas? I think that people who visit this blog would "get it" a bit quicker when they see examples of how absolutely beautiful their painting can be, as they learn and apply what they learn from Graydon's Color Wheel and Painting System. They could see the difference between how they are currently using color, and the difference Graydon's discovery produces.









Moving from left to right, in these three balls, only the intensity/chroma has changed, not the value. (Don't you love what the correct chroma string can do to a simple object?)

* Above picture from Color Theory Made Easy - Jim Ames

5B6/10

After Neal's excellent advise and finally receiving a good phthalo blue and phthalo green, I decided to revisit those hues on my wheel. I did several of them over. The greener shade of phthlo green really makes a difference, however...

...the 5B6/10 is just giving me fits! I've tried just about everything and the chroma just won't go high/clean enough. Is this the one that needs the genuine manganese? or those nano whites? I've tried Titanium and Zinc - please help!

(I'd hate to have an open spot on the wheel or fall back to the 5B4/10 that I used initially.)