Do you have colors gathering dust?

Hi friends! When I did my live painting class Friday of a seascape I brought out some colors that I don’t typically use and I enjoyed the freshness of adding those unique hues to my palette. One color I thought I hated but I had a tube of it because it came in a set: Naples Yellow but it was the perfect shade for the beach as well as adding some subtle luminosity to my waves. I started to think of all of the other colors I had turned my nose up at. Do I have treasures collecting dust in a drawer waiting to be unleashed on paper? Then one of my regulars to the live stream who always has tons of valuable info to add Dr Rich Boden (a genuine scientist!) challenged me to make a painting using 3-6 colors that I rarely use. I thought it was a heck of an idea and here are my forgotten favorites:

paintchallenge

My colors are:

  • Winsor & Newton Opera
  • DaVinci Vermillion
  • Winsor & Newton Aureolin
  • MaimeriBlu Hookers Green
  • Mission Gold Peacock Blue
  • M Graham Van Dyke Brown

You can read more about his challenge here. Now, his challenge has rules and I’m gonna try but I’m not big on rules and art so I was supposed to tag someone but I can’t pick favorites so I decided to challenge ALL OF YOU who want to play along! I think that it would be easiest to hop on the Frugalcrafter Facebook page and post on this thread either a link to your video or blog post (so you can get a little love on your site) this will also serve friends who don’t have a blog or YouTube because they can easily post photos of their palette and finished paintings right there in the comments. I want to make it so anyone can play along with or without a website. Let’s have fun and encourage each other! So according to Rich’s rules I have 24 hours to create a 30 minute or less painting. There might be a spontaneous live show sometime in the next 24 hours just to give you a heads up:)

Speaking of paint, I recorded this vlog about lightfastness a few months ago. Good thing because I have been slacking off big time this weekend so otherwise there would not be a video! BTW there might be a couple of days with no posts this week as I am putting the finishing touches on my class for Wanderlust 2016 and that is this weeks priority. I probably could have got that done today but I had some important napping in the sun to do;)

I hope you enjoyed this odd, eclectic blog post and I hope you will dust off those unloved tubes of paint (and it does not need to be watercolor) and give them some love. If you are posting on social media use the hashtag #paintFFchal and people can search it (don’t ask me how it works, I’m clueless, it’s not my circus, I’m just the monkey LOL!) Thanks for stopping by and til next time happy crafting!

22 thoughts on “Do you have colors gathering dust?

  1. You picked better colours than me 😉 I wish I’d picked a brighter blue…! I’ve already broken the rules and going to paint it 48h after picking the colours as I didn’t have time today.

    Some of your forgotten ones – the two fugitives Opera Rose and Aureolin are amongst my regulars – Aureolin is very useful with Quin Magenta and Cobalt Blue if you ever want process-primary style results in watercolour, whilst keeping the transparency and light.
    Good luck! Hope it doesn’t turn out too ugly 😉
    R

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  2. Hello friend, I am so sorry about this, but I am finally getting my emails and my life straighter out. I asked you a while ago if you would like some democrats(I think that’s the name of it, but anyways,I have a lot of papers,, laces, and tons of other products, that I thought u may like. See I purchased a huge jumbo collection last fall that was PRODUCTS that cover the whole year this year. The company I ordered this from suggested that we buy two collections as there are so many different ones, chances were that I would receive a different set for the second one. Guess what, they were identical. So I thought of you, and have asked you previously but I have not received your answer. I am making cards for people with cancer, but I used my first set and still have a ton left. Bless you, I really enjoy getting your newsletter! Lisa. P.S. If you would like things, please give me your address so that I can ship them to you!

    Thefrugalcrafters Weblog wrote: > a:hover { color: red; } a { text-decoration: none; color: #0088cc; } a.primaryactionlink:link, a.primaryactionlink:visited { background-color: #2585B2; color: #fff; } a.primaryactionlink:hover, a.primaryactionlink:active { background-color: #11729E !important; color: #fff !important; } /* @media only screen and (max-device-width: 480px) { .post { min-width: 700px !important; } } */ WordPress.com thefrugalcrafter posted: “Hi friends! When I did my live painting class Friday of a seascape I brought out some colors that I don’t typically use and I enjoyed the freshness of adding those unique hues to my palette. One color I thought I hated but I had a tube of it because it ca”

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    1. Thank you for your sweet offer Lisa but I have so much already that I have yet to use that I will have to pass. I do appreciate the offer though:)

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  3. I don’t know anything about light-fast anything. But I do have a gripe and a question. First the gripe. I’m crocheting afghans for my nieces and great-nieces and am about 1/2 way done. I found your You Tube channel and have been binge watching things. So now I’m all inspired and want to play with paper, but I have to get the afghans done or else I’ll just let them slide. I’m so tortured! Poor me, right? 🙂

    Anyway, to my questions. 1. Are you bringing back “ask a crafter”? and

    2. I’m going to be making an art journal for a very artistically talented niece. I want to include smaller booklets of papers she will use. I have some water paint paper, but am thinking that it will limit her options in terms of what she can do. I was wondering about multimedia paper. Is that paper that you can do pretty much everything your heart desires? Can she use it for drawing, water colour/acrylic paint, etc individually or are there specific uses for it. I want to have as much bang for my buck as possible. In Canada, art paper is expensive and I don’t have endless money to put out (as much as I would like). What sort of paper (not the brand as we may have different brands here) would you recommend for my aspirations?

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  4. I’d like to know why you don’t like these paints, do they behave in a weird way or do you just dislike the color? Sometimes I like the appearance of a color but I just don’t seem to paint anything that requires that specific color unless I sneak it into a painting like changing the color of somebody’s jacket.

    What puzzles me is that you wrote that brand of Hooker’s Green is made from PG7 (like Winsor Green) but it looks more like Sap Green, not at all like a VERY vivid unnatural blueish Winsor Green. Names don’t seem to mean anything. I noticed that when I ordered some new paints online from a different brand and burnt sienna turned out to be something unfamilar that never seems to make gray mixed with ultramarine like I am used to.

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    1. PG7 (Phthalo Green) has been split into other colours now like PG7:1, PG7:2 and so on – they are your Phthalo Green (Blue shade) and (Yellow shade) and other variations. Manufacturers don’t have to declare the “:1” part of the pigment code at present. Winsor Green is a synonym for Phthalo Green and comes in blue and yellow shades – this one being akin to the yellow shade. Concentration makes a big difference too. Hooker’s Green proper is a mix of Gamboge with Prussian Blue and is very granulating so a clean single dye staining paint sold under the same name is a v odd choice. The same manufacturer lists their Hooker’s Green as Phthalo Blue and Quin Gold mix – evidently they changed the formula at some stage.
      R

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      1. Thanks! It seems pigments are more complicated than I thought. I actually was astonished how many different colors are made of PV 19 alone. I think there’s more to it all than I realize.

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      2. I wondered what the : meant as one of my colors had a colon in it. I was psyched to see a hookers that looked so much like a sap be a single pigment as sap is a mix and I like to muddy my own colors LOL! I am deciding weather or not to bite the bullet on the mission gold set of 36 on sale at amazon for $50 (reg $200) but is has so many mixes in it. Reviews are great though and i have had so many requests to review (I need more paint like a hole in the head tho LOL!)

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        1. beware of the Mission Gold burnt sienna, that’s the paint I mentioned that never mixes to a gray ….

          thanks for answering my question about your “neglected paints”, I bought so many paints by and by I never used more than once information like this is very useful for me!

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        2. I just saw Mission Gold offers a set called “Pure Pigments” with colors only consisting of a single pigment. That sounds nice, doesn’t it?

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            1. what a BARGAIN! The cheapeast I can get them here in Germany is 150€. The set contains 26 tubes, 24 colors plus white and black which I’d probably never use. Now THAT would be something for me to try out: how could black and white possibly be useful for me?

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    2. yes, that hooks looks like a sap and it is a single pigment. OK here is my deal:
      Opera: love the color but it was expensive and “too precious” to use on just any painting, then I realized that it is not that lightfast so I felt bad purchasing it.
      Aurelien (spelling): Again, kinda pricey and looked green grey in the tube so I thought it would be yuck but painted out it is actually yum!
      Vermilion: I usually use cadmium red, I forgot this came in a mixing set
      Hookers green: Usually I don’t care for this color and did not realize that this brand of hookers is bright and lively (also came in a set)
      Peacock blue: A friend gave me this, she got it as a sample and I have not had a chance to use it yet
      Van Dyke Brown: I still hate this color (along with sepia) as it seems to be a lifeless brown but I got a deal on the full line of M Graham years ago and this was in the mix. I will try and make it useful:)

      I am looking forward to painting with these today!

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      1. I hate Vandyke also. Sepia I grew to love when using it as very strong washes in my colour study before doing my painting as I chose Sepia as my neglected brown.

        Aureolin is fugitive in watercolour but fine in oils. It’s a beautiful colour and gives some pretty oranges.
        R

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  5. I wrote an entire comment and it didn’t appear. Dang.

    I wrote three things. The first was chastising you for being so gosh darned inspiring. I have 2.5 afghans to get finished (crochet) for my nieces and great-nieces and here you are luring me away to my paper crafting! 🙂

    The second was a question. I’m making an art journal packet for one of my nieces. She’s a very talented artist and I wanted to give her something she could use and think of me when she’s doing so. I picked up some water colour paper (1/2 price at Michaels). Then I got to thinking that having only that paper may limit what she can use the journal for. Then I got the brilliant idea to make a combo package of different types of paper. Then I got more realistic as to what I can afford. So, this comes to my question. Is multimedia paper a good all purpose art paper? Can it be used for drawing, or water colour, or pastels, etc. I want to make sure she can use it for basic art work as well as getting all imaginative with multiple media.

    The third will wait until I get through all of your videos to see if you’ve answered the question already there.

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    1. sounds like you have a good start on supplies for her. I like the Canson XL mixed media book and most craft stores, even wal mart has it, the 9″x12″ that I have sells for about $10 usually. It is a good all around wet/dry media paper and 60 sheets in a pad!

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