Color swatch with alizarin crimson

I mentioned in my last blogpost that I want to do color swatches in order to find out the range of colors I can get by mixing the paints I have.

I started with mixing acrylic inks. I grabbed the bottle with alizarin crimson and the Dare Orange Molotow refill bottle. I used empty joghurt cups for the mixing (one for the Alizarin Crimson, one for the Dare Orange, one for White and one for Black). Adding the Orange to the Crimson results in a Warm medium red; adding the black results in a dark red which is still warm, not as muted down as burgundy. 

Then I added white and got some interesting pinks. 

What did I learn? First of all, liquid acrylics are harder to mix than acrylic paints out of the tube. The next thing I noticed was the importance of adding only a tiny amount of black to the red. Just touch the black ink with the brush ever so lightly, otherwise it will get way too dark. 

I'll continue with color swatching and will keep the paper scraps in a box. I write down the names of the colors which I used for the mixing and the steps I am taking. This is the beginning of something which I find useful and enjoyable!

Green and Blue shades

I actually have three rather big acrylic paint tubes with shades of green:

• A 150 ml tube of Hooker's Green (System 3, Daler & Rowney)
• A 100 ml tube of Sap Green (Pebeo)
• And a 59 ml tube of Phthalo Green (System 3)

All three of these tubes were bought a long time ago. 

I started the painting in order to practise some mixing with adding white or yellow, even a bit of black in order to darken the greens. I also added some greenish blue. 

I enjoyed the painting, but somehow I have the strong feeling that I really need to do a color chart, starting with my greens. I've got some not very expensive watercolor paper from the 1 Euro shop which will be a perfect surface for color charting. 

 

Using aluminium foil for a palette

 

I have been using all kinds of palettes for color mixing with acrylics:

• plastic lids of yoghurt containers
• coated paper platesa 

Both are doable, but have their disadvantages: The plastic lids of the yoghurt containers are too small to mix paints adequately with a palette knife. 

The Coated paper plates suck in paint although they are coated. In addition to that once the paper plate is covered with blobs of paint you have to get rid of them. 

So I went for a third way of mixing colors on a palette: I bought aluminium foil and covered one of my paper plates with it. I fixed it on the back with a tape. Then I mixed acrylic inks and acrylic craft paints on it. I noticed that acrylic inks took a bit longer to dry which is definitely an advantage. Craft paints can be mixed without any problems using a palette knife. Yes, you have to be a bit careful with the knife and not scrape too hard, but otherwise things went well. 

Change the style of an image in Gemini

This is a diaslide I took a long time ago during a vacation in the North of Italy. When I shot the photo I felt attracted by the Renaissance architecture. I kept the slide, had it digitalized and then it sat in the depths of my hard drive.

Knowing that you can have changed the style of an image in Gemini I uploaded the image to Gemini and asked it to transform the photo into a watercolor and ink image.

Here is the result. Gemini actually changed the style. I personally would prefer it to the original.

Mixing acrylic paints with a palette knife

I have a set of plastic palette knifes which I bought years ago. I haven't used them much - whenever I tried to use them I had the impression that I was doing it the wrong way, and so I stopped. In addition to that I have been using acrylic inks mostly, and mixing them was fine whenever I used the brush to mix. 

However a few days ago I was looking at my collection of acrylic paint tubes (all kind of brands, some heavy body, some soft body, some craft paints) and thought that maybe using a palette knife for color mixing and flattening out the blob of paint could help me with doing a detailed painting even with acrylic tube paints. I watched some videos on YouTube, and then I took my heart into my hands andpa tried it myself. You can see the result in the painting above: The various shades of grey were done with mixing a grey craft paint with a white no namer by using a paöette knife. Of course I need a lot more practice, but I feel that I am on the right way.

In addition to that I tried another new thing: I added some strokes with watercolor brush pens on top of the acrylic painting. 

 

Switching from Inktense to Acrylics

Yes, I love to switch between mediums. I enjoyed painting with inktense pencils and markers, but some days ago I decided to switch over to Acrylics - acrylic inks and acrylics out of the tube.

My first step was to empty the drawer in which I am storing my acrylic inks and to put up a list of all my inks. In the end I was really surprised how many inks I have!

Then I fetched a piece of watercolor paper and taped it down to a wooden surface. I took my pencil and let the lines go wild - same as I had done in my inktense painting process. When the lines were on the paper I grabbed three acrylic ink bottles: one containing Siena, the second one containing Carmine red and the third one containing indigo. I color blocked the spaces between the lines. In addition to that I grabbed a tube with yellow ochre, one of my empty yoghurt containers and a pipette. I had always had difficulties with detailed coloring when using paint out of the tube, so I decided to thin the tube paint down with a bit of water and stir it with an old brush. It worked. Adding the black and white lines to the painting was the last step. 

Let the lines go wild!

For this painting I sat down and let my pencil run over the paper, creating a set of round lines crossing each other, drawing some S shapes and avoiding straight lines. Then I filled the spaces between the lines with color, still using my inktense pencils. In the end I used an alcohol marker to fill out the background.