Paint palette

Scott

Double Actioner
So my background (if you can call it that) is in oil painting and I am use to color mixing with a specific palette and got to the point where I was fairly efficient mixing colors from that palette.

getting into painting with an airbrush and watching a ton a videos lately it appears as though most artist do more optical mixing on the actual painting surfaces. Which makes me wonder would going out and getting my same oil painting palette for airbrush painting be worth it or would it be a waste of money and time?
 
Guys here are so good, they are doing this with their eyes. Me on other hand not so good. I also need to get the same color many times. I am enjoying making t-shirts and I would like to be able to reproduce the same t-shirt many times. So I made my own color palette which is growing each month. I would assume what your goal is determines what is the best way for you. I bought color wheel when I started.
This one:
ab_colorwhirl.jpg


Cards works for me, but they are useless to many people here probably.

WP_20200304_002.jpg WP_20200304_001.jpg
 
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Husky

thank you, most what what I plan on painting is the same sort of thing I paint in oils which is wildlife, landscapes and maybe a portrait every now and then.
 
Well, if my babbling helps you I am happy. :)

Check videos from our forum member @Nada

here is a link to one of his videos about colors.

He made 6 videos just about colors. Find his playlist about colors. Also if you subscribe you can get many usefull info which will help you down the road. I am not payed to get people to his channel :cool: I am also subscribed to him. We have quite a few forum members which are putting great content on you tube, and you can also bother them here if you got more questions :laugh:
 
I check it out tonight when I get home. I love watching color theory and painting videos. I have a relatively basic understanding of color theory. I just don’t quite have an understanding of airbrush color mixing as of yet, is it easier to just use different layers to create a color or to mix the desired color and spray it
 
Golden High Flow matches there color to their tube paints . So mixing color would give you the same feel as when you oil painted.
Me being red/green color blind use their https://www.goldenpaints.com/mixer to pick colors from reference pictures to aid me in my color matching.

I was actually thinking of using their fluid line as they have the exact palette that used with oils where the high flows are missing some colors. Same concept though I think, or not maybe I’m potentially making a 100 dollar mistake
 
I think it's always a good idea to make your own color wheels with your paints of choice and pin them up on the wall nearby. It can be a tedious exercise to be sure, but it can also be a lifesaver. Especially if you move between different kinds of paint. I have CI, Wicked, Golden, and Aero paints I use for different supports, and there is quite a bit of difference in saturation and hue brand to brand, and even within a brand between different lines of paint.

It's useful to learn how heavily pigmented an actual color out of a bottle is, and take notes on your color wheels. CI for example, I find a single drop of the cobalt blue is way stronger than the color of the same name in their wicked series of paints. Using Golden Hi Flow, the quinacridone red massively overpowers any hansa yellow. Mix them in equal parts and you don't get a middle color, you pretty much get quinacridone red with a very light yellow cast.

Learning the theory is fundamental for sure, but the particular characteristics of your paints of choice will never match up to the theory. So it is always worth spending a day with your paint making your own color wheels or following @huskystafford 's great idea of building up a reference binder over time.

Golden does publish a wheel and guide for their paints and the online tool that @Mr.Micron linked. I find that they are pretty accurate, but the properties of sprayed color do tend to shift from the guide more than color applied with a traditional brush.

Spending a bit of time mixing your paints, taking notes and spraying your own wheels or palette tiles is time well spent. :)
 
L
I think it's always a good idea to make your own color wheels with your paints of choice and pin them up on the wall nearby. It can be a tedious exercise to be sure, but it can also be a lifesaver. Especially if you move between different kinds of paint. I have CI, Wicked, Golden, and Aero paints I use for different supports, and there is quite a bit of difference in saturation and hue brand to brand, and even within a brand between different lines of paint.

It's useful to learn how heavily pigmented an actual color out of a bottle is, and take notes on your color wheels. CI for example, I find a single drop of the cobalt blue is way stronger than the color of the same name in their wicked series of paints. Using Golden Hi Flow, the quinacridone red massively overpowers any hansa yellow. Mix them in equal parts and you don't get a middle color, you pretty much get quinacridone red with a very light yellow cast.

Learning the theory is fundamental for sure, but the particular characteristics of your paints of choice will never match up to the theory. So it is always worth spending a day with your paint making your own color wheels or following @huskystafford 's great idea of building up a reference binder over time.

Golden does publish a wheel and guide for their paints and the online tool that @Mr.Micron linked. I find that they are pretty accurate, but the properties of sprayed color do tend to shift from the guide more than color applied with a traditional brush.

Spending a bit of time mixing your paints, taking notes and spraying your own wheels or palette tiles is time well spent. :)

Yup I agree with you, color theory isn’t so much of an issue (by far not an expert with it but understand relatively well) its more the practical sense from an airbrushing perspective. When I watch videos of people airbrushing it doesn’t appear as though they premix their color that they are trying to hit as much as they layer pint to achieve the same result. I wasn’t sure if getting the same color palette that I’m use too in oils and mixing my colors and then laying them down was worth the time.
 
I think it’s because airbrushing by nature is a layering of paint so the user needs to consider the colour underneath. Many members use transparent which are great for achieving a wanted colour shift, not so good when it’s not wanted eg: light I’ve dark, most notably white over black)
When spraying opaques it’s still not a fully saturated colour so there is still an element of minor transparency until full saturation is achieved.
 
With a brush doing oils you get the color right away as soon as you put it down, Where with the air brush you work in thin layers of paint so it builds the color up to where you want it so having a resource to look at will help alot
 
I think the biggest thing you will have to deal with is the shifting nature of light over dark, oils allow that, where the airbrush shifts to blue (if opaque) I’m guess you would glaze with Oils, if so that’s closer to airbrushing - at least that’s how I see it.
Getting the same colour palette would be fine, if you use opaque paints you would be best starting light and going dark, if using Transparents, it doesn’t matter :) Using the Createx Illustration colour wheel set, I have nice hues, that are very saturated, I can add white to make them opaque if needed,
 
I think the biggest thing you will have to deal with is the shifting nature of light over dark, oils allow that, where the airbrush shifts to blue (if opaque) I’m guess you would glaze with Oils, if so that’s closer to airbrushing - at least that’s how I see it.
Getting the same colour palette would be fine, if you use opaque paints you would be best starting light and going dark, if using Transparents, it doesn’t matter :) Using the Createx Illustration colour wheel set, I have nice hues, that are very saturated, I can add white to make them opaque if needed,

thanks. In oils I did a mix of glazing and opaque passages. Most of the colors I use are very very muted so full saturation is not something I am overly concerned with, in fact in the paintings I’ve done I don’t know if I’ve ever done anything at full saturation. As an example: Cadmium yellow is a color on my oil painting palette and I can’t think of a time when I’ve used it, typically I fall back on my transparent iron oxide yellow.
 
Hi Scott. You being a brush painter, my advice would always be start by premixing your colors. Since you are already used to mixing colors. Although it is easier to mix tube paints than airbrush paints simply because it’s easier to grab a little of a glob of paint than add drops... you can’t really lay airbrush paints out on a palette.

this allows you to build time to learn to blend and control the airbrush. Opaque are much easier skill wise to control saturation and value when beginning. Working from light to dark of course is necessary, and then learning to control soft and hard edges you will rapidly see progress.

now mixing optically on a surface is definitely a fun way to paint, it’s also much quicker, but it does however require more attention to how colors will blend. With practice and time you will know how the color will change. iE I will often use a color more towards violet if I’m coming back with yellow to make a brown. However doing that with opaque would cause a lot of shift not only of blue but creating muddy looking tones. (Which despite many claims are not simply from the blue shift although blueshift being the most predominate reason)

as for transparent ochres, red oxide, iron oxide etc. I think you will find them extremely saturated in airbrush paints. Actually I love them in goldens line to brighten images. Which is another subject altogether. How transparent each line of paint is versus another. While I mainly use createx illustration now, it is because of the versatility because I paint on metal, canvas, papers, synthetics as well. Not because I think they are the cleanest line of paint. Golden high flows are much more transparent and more saturated than CI, however they are also thinner and cover less.

anyhoo before I ramble too long here. Pick a line of paints, get a transparent set, and a BIG bottle of white. Mix your semi opaques and work light to dark. This will save you hundreds of hours of attempting to learn more than one line of paints at a time. Vastly increasing your learning curve (no I didn’t follow this advice, I wish someone had given this advice to me early on, I tried every brand I could find). Having that transparent set will allow the flexibility of making your own opaque, and then still having transparent to tint with. All without having to have 50 different bottles of paint.
Bill AKA W Leon.
 
Hi Scott. You being a brush painter, my advice would always be start by premixing your colors. Since you are already used to mixing colors. Although it is easier to mix tube paints than airbrush paints simply because it’s easier to grab a little of a glob of paint than add drops... you can’t really lay airbrush paints out on a palette.

this allows you to build time to learn to blend and control the airbrush. Opaque are much easier skill wise to control saturation and value when beginning. Working from light to dark of course is necessary, and then learning to control soft and hard edges you will rapidly see progress.

now mixing optically on a surface is definitely a fun way to paint, it’s also much quicker, but it does however require more attention to how colors will blend. With practice and time you will know how the color will change. iE I will often use a color more towards violet if I’m coming back with yellow to make a brown. However doing that with opaque would cause a lot of shift not only of blue but creating muddy looking tones. (Which despite many claims are not simply from the blue shift although blueshift being the most predominate reason)

as for transparent ochres, red oxide, iron oxide etc. I think you will find them extremely saturated in airbrush paints. Actually I love them in goldens line to brighten images. Which is another subject altogether. How transparent each line of paint is versus another. While I mainly use createx illustration now, it is because of the versatility because I paint on metal, canvas, papers, synthetics as well. Not because I think they are the cleanest line of paint. Golden high flows are much more transparent and more saturated than CI, however they are also thinner and cover less.

anyhoo before I ramble too long here. Pick a line of paints, get a transparent set, and a BIG bottle of white. Mix your semi opaques and work light to dark. This will save you hundreds of hours of attempting to learn more than one line of paints at a time. Vastly increasing your learning curve (no I didn’t follow this advice, I wish someone had given this advice to me early on, I tried every brand I could find). Having that transparent set will allow the flexibility of making your own opaque, and then still having transparent to tint with. All without having to have 50 different bottles of paint.
Bill AKA W Leon.

thank you this was a very informative post. I really really appreciate it
 
thank you this was a very informative post. I really really appreciate it
You are welcome. And welcome to the forum, I started here and learned a great deal. I went on to much more study and going back to text books among other things since. But the vast knowledge in this forum was a huge blessing to me. Starting as a hobby, to a more serious hobby, to now a beginning career in the arts.
 
@ Scott
as Nada said.
Consider 16 transparents + opaque white. Transparent colors give you more space to mix own colors. Especially if you are not sure if you prefer an opaque or transparent way. Mixing opaque + opaque usually just don't work. Sorry, you may need to develop your own "Air Brush palette" anew
 
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