Portable Palette

[oilan]

 A too-long post talking about colors and the process of putting together a paint palette! I've lately gotten the urge to put together a new watercolor palette -- specifically one that is travel friendly. Formerly, this would have meant my typical limited palette to save space (alizarin crimson, ultramarine blue, yellow ochre, burnt sienna, and burnt umber*), but I decided to do something different this time.

I've been using watercolor for years and even though I dabble in other things, it's very much "my" media. I've got a pretty good handle on color theory and mixing colors and I know very well which colors I frequently use, so I thought I'd give myself a little leeway and have fun. Some considerations:

• Being both spoiled and picky, I decided to spare no expense and went for Daniel Smith watercolors for everything. Pricy, but worth it imo. Their paints rewet beautifully when dried into a palette and are very pigmented (which means a little goes a long way). They also have a HUGE number of options, and their website is very helpful in describing and showing swatches of each color. I already had a couple tubes of Daniel Smith beforehand and was very impressed by their quality and how they handle on the page. 
• Colors I frequently use on their own or for mixing were taken into account first and foremost (see my base palette above), but since this palette is meant to be for travel (with limited space for mixing colors) I also decided to include some convenience colors -- shades I use frequently that must otherwise be mixed -- and a couple of colors I just thought were nice and want to experiment with.
• Second, I took transparency and granulation into account somewhat. All of the colors I ended up picking are transparent -- even yellow ochre, which is opaque and slightly chalky in a lot of other brands. Transparency is up to personal preference, of course, but if I wanted a more opaque watercolor, I'd probably just use gouache instead. Granulation was a very minor consideration, since a lot of the colors I liked ended up being granulating even though I prefer non-granulating, but you can't have everything I guess!
• The palette itself was also important to consider, not just the colors that go into it. In the end, I decided that it would be best to get an empty palette and buy a bunch of empty half and full pans to fill. All flexibility! I can have full pans of the colors I use frequently, half pans of the colors I don't, and move/rotate them out if I need to. The palette I bought holds 24 half pans or 12 full pans -- portable (about the size of a thin pencil case), but still large enough to hold lots of paint. It also folds out to give more space for mixing.

The final palette is below:

Top row:

• Titanium white: an opaque (for watercolor anyway) white, just for final highlights.
• Alizarin crimson: Pretty much the only red I ever use. Very flexible, can easily be mixed into something warmer or cooler, and good to include in some skin tones.
• French ultramarine: A basic blue. If I decide to switch this palette up in future, this color would be the first to go, probably. It's very useful, again, especially in a basic palette, but I was very meh about it when I swatched it. It granulates a lot and I've been using pthalo blue more and more, since that was included in my liquid set while ultramarine was not. Maybe I'll fall back in love with it -- we'll see.
• Indigo: A convenience color. Good for making dark blues/blacks and also an excellent color for things like 19th century coats.
• Pthalo blue (Red Shade): My new(ish) favorite blue. I like how dark it can get while still looking lovely when diluted. Good for for both Enjolraic eyes and Enjolraic waistcoats!
• Quinacridone Purple: Lovely on its own, but also useful for darkening up yellows without making them muddy. Also a good color for horrid frock coats certain poets might wear!
• Rose of Ultramarine: Just an interesting color I wanted to try. I'm not that impressed with it, but to be fair I did not swatch it very well. It's a mix of Quinacridone Rose and Ultramarine Blue, with the rose floating while the blue granulates out, resulting in a two-tone layered effect.
• Deep Sap Green: Another convenience color. I don't use a lot of green in my art, but when I do it's for large areas like grassy fields. It's annoying to have to mix up a huge batch of the precise shade of green I want, so this is a good, natural green to use as a base color.
• Moonglow: I've had my eye on this paint for years, and it's finally mine! Again, I swatched it badly (I think I need practice with these multi-pigment paints) but it contains Anthraquinoid Red, which floats, Ultramarine Blue, which granulates out, and Viridian, which greys out the purple color of the whole. Would be nice as an easy, lazy, and moody shadow color, or as a nice Combeferre waistcoat, I think!

Bottom Row:

• Sepia, Burnt Umber, and Burnt Sienna: Just my arsenal of browns of varying values and warmth. Good, natural colors for painting people especially (sepia + burnt umber = perfect Combeferre hair color). Burnt sienna in particular is a color I'd be lost without.
• Payne's grey: I've never used this color except in my liquid watercolor set, which came with a very muddy, bluish green Payne's Grey. I make use of it, but this one here is much nicer, and seems like it would be a good color for making rich blacks (for coat collars or shoes or top hats, perhaps?)
• Naples Yellow: Another color I've never used before -- a muted yellow traditionally used as a base for a lot of skin tones. It will probably help a lot in bringing more warmth and life into my skin tones -- and even though it's my policy not to use just one color when mixing skin tones, it's pretty much spot on for Enjolras'.
• Yellow ochre: A yellow ochre that's transparent and not chalky! Another staple color, good for skin tones, hair, and so much more.
• Aureolin: I debated forever about getting another yellow, since yellow ochre has been my tried and true for a very long time, and I had cadmium yellow in my collection in the past and just never used it, but I decided to just try it out. Did I pick this one just because my Enjolras' middle name (or at least one of them) is the too-on-the-nose Aurélien? Maybe, but I'm glad I got it. I was a bit concerned when I squeezed it in the pan, since it looks like a very ugly mustard, but it turns into a pretty sunshiny yellow when on paper.

All in all, I'm pleased about the whole thing. All that's left is to test it out (which I'm doing as I type this) though I think it will end up being a pretty cohesive palette on the whole. If not, I have some extra empty pans to fill and switch out if the palette needs refining!

*Despite all of the above waffling and how fun it is to pick out colors, I HIGHLY recommend this limited palette (plus white for opaque media) for anyone starting off with a new kind of paint, or someone with a limited budget/storage space. You can get a good idea of how the paint works while also being able to mix pretty much any color you want, but it's not such an investment that you've wasted hundreds of dollars starting a new type of media in the event you decide it's not for you. These are also good base colors to have in your collection before you decide to expand your palette.