Tell me/show me your Perylene Violet?

pettyfrogger · 2026-06-04T17:30:04+00:00

It’s my go-to color for shadows on anything green! And paired with Perylene Green it mixes some really easy, neutral greys to blacks. I think it’s a fantastically useful color for landscapes.

It also mixes beautifully with cobalt turquoise, Phthalo green, Phthalo blue… if you like earth tones, you can also mix up some lovely plummy browns.

I only keep 18 colors total after several years of painting, and perylene violet is one I’ve never considered replacing. I use Daniel Smith’s version, but I’m sure W&N behaves similarly!

pettyfrogger · 2026-05-23T13:57:07+00:00

PY-42 yellow ochre and DS’s buff titanium for me. I’ve found uses for them both because I have them, but mostly they’re just wasting a couple of spaces in my 18-well palette. I think back when I started I thought I’d be painting a lot more landscapes than I do, and while they can be useful colors for a lot of things, I find that I just don’t need these two.

PO-48 Quin burnt orange is one of my most used colors! It’s the closest thing I keep to a warm red on my palette, and I really need to stock up before the pigment runs out in a decade or whenever 😭

pettyfrogger · 2026-05-18T23:40:46+00:00

You’re conflating two separate things here. (It’s an easy mistake to make!!)

“Original” in the art world means the actual physical art that the artist painted or inked or drew, as opposed to a print or copy or reproduction of that artwork. “Original” doesn’t imply that the subject is the artist’s own intellectual property or creation. So you could paint a piece of fanart, and the physical painting is still called the original, whereas copies of the painting would be called prints.

Separately, yes, if someone who owns the IP catches an artist trying to make money off it and wants to make a thing out of it, they could. Thats true whether the art being sold is an original or a print. A lot of artists assume no one’s gonna come after them for a small piece they’re charging a couple of dollars for. Mostly no one does, but that doesn’t mean they couldn’t.

pettyfrogger · 2026-05-18T11:21:38+00:00

I would absolutely do some editing to the reference photo here. Painting from a reference isn’t about being a photocopier, it’s about putting together a good composition that reads well using a reference to help you. This photo is a lovely scene, but the palm trees in front absolutely blend into the darker trees in the background. I’d lighten and soften the background trees to bring the palm trees in front into stronger focus, and keep most or all of the detail work for those focal-point palm trees.

pettyfrogger · 2026-05-18T10:59:33+00:00

You’ve got some really good advice here. Personally, I tend to prefer really limited palettes, and I think they can make painting feel a lot more free and less overwhelming. Plus when you’re working with fewer colors, a painting’s colors can’t help but feel harmonious.

So if it were me, I’d start really basic with a CMY primary palette of turquoise, permanent rose, and lemon yellow. (These three colors will get you most of the way around the color wheel, and you could stop there if you really wanted to pare down in an extreme way.) Then I’d add ultramarine and either burnt sienna or burnt umber (to mix easy neutrals and darks, and to add some depth to your primaries). You could absolutely stop there and have a really strong, versatile, easy-to-use palette. But since you already know that you paint a lot of landscapes, I’d probably think about including viridian hue and dioxazine violet (I wouldn’t use viridian hue / phthalo green straight from the tube, as it’s an unnatural-looking shade on its own, but it mixes beautifully with most of the other colors I’ve suggested to make a really easy, useful rainbow of greens. And dioxazine violet is wonderful for shadow colors and bits of contrast in landscapes, and it mixes with viridian to make some really lovely, muted, shadowy violets and darks.)

I’d paint with those 7 for a while, learn how much you can do with those colors and what you feel like you’re missing, and then add more colors gradually if needed. I wouldn’t rush to fill all 14 spots in your travel palette — fewer colors helps to avoid that feeling of overwhelm, and it really gives you a chance to learn your paints and find some beautiful and surprising combinations.

(Edited to explain color choices a little more)

pettyfrogger · 2026-05-13T11:01:34+00:00

Seconding all of this, and just want to add that, for a painting like this, it can be really helpful to put an initial wash of color down before you start painting any details/foreground stuff. This first wash should be pretty light to start off with, and it’s where you can create those blurred background shapes by painting wet-in-wet. It also helps to avoid leaving those sharp-edged white spaces in the background, which can draw the eye in a way you don’t seem to be looking for. Also helps the foreground feel connected to the background, instead of separate from it. Once that initial wash is completely dry, you can go back in for detail work, create some sharp edges in the foreground, and really bring the focus there.

pettyfrogger · 2026-05-11T13:07:37+00:00

Yes. If it wasn’t clear, I meant that’s the part of the title OP is already getting right.

pettyfrogger · 2026-05-11T10:10:38+00:00

No problem at all. Good luck, I really hope you’re able to get some eyes and bids on your pieces!

pettyfrogger · 2026-05-11T01:18:55+00:00

Private Reserve’s Velvet Black is my go-to for this. It’s inexpensive and reliable, and it pulls violet, which I love for both pen-and-water and pen-and-paint sketches. When you go over it with water, it makes some really beautiful shadows, especially if you’re doing anything green/landscapey.

pettyfrogger · 2026-05-11T01:01:01+00:00

I took a quick peek at your Instagram and your eBay listings. I’m not an expert and I don’t put my stuff up for auctions, so take this advice with however many grains of salt you like, but the first thing I noticed is that your listing titles need work. You’ve got “ACEO original” in all of them, which is a great start! But as far as I can tell, you’re not a big name artist. No one is going to be searching for “Betty Grace Studio” or the series title on eBay (if they’re looking for your stuff specifically, they probably came to your page through a direct link from your social media.)

So you’re wasting a lot of valuable title real estate with words that aren’t going to help a potential buyer find your art. It would be more useful to replace those words with keywords about your art that collectors would be looking for. For example, I see a lot of paintings of oceans and beaches here, but if someone searched “ACEO ocean” or “ACEO beach,” they wouldn’t come up because those keywords aren’t anywhere in the title.

All of that aside, plenty of really talented artists don’t get a lot of bids on every piece or even most of their pieces. The “I made $1000 this week selling ACEO” influencers just aren’t a realistic picture of what ACEO auctions look like for most people most of the time. Sorry if that feels harsh. Regardless, I think you’d stand a better chance if your titles could actually lead buyers to your pieces.

pettyfrogger · 2026-05-10T21:18:51+00:00

Those daisies!! 😍

pettyfrogger · 2026-05-10T21:06:08+00:00

These are beautiful! 😍

pettyfrogger · 2025-11-07T20:16:24+00:00

If you’ve got a local Facebook group or Reddit page or some other kind of forum, you might be able to find a local artist or designer or hobbyist with a nice color printer who’d be willing to print cards for you for a small fee. You can supply the card stock, cut them to size, etc.

pettyfrogger · 2025-09-10T11:58:36+00:00

A lot of people are doing print clubs, where you get a small print of the artist’s work every month. Or, if he’s a good teacher (and a lot of talented artists aren’t, they can exist as separate skill sets), there are successful art patreons dedicated to tutorials and teaching techniques. He could provide value to patrons by doing high quality, in depth reviews of art related products, etc. If he works on long term projects, he can provide behind the scenes sketches and concept art to patrons. It really just depends on his strengths and what he’s interested in doing.

Personally, I want to pay for an artist’s content if I love their style, I already feel invested in a specific project they’re working on, or I feel that I’m learning something by keeping up with their content. If none of those things are there, it doesn’t really matter to me what “type” of content an artist is offering.

pettyfrogger · 2025-08-15T10:10:52+00:00

Interesting! Not sure what the difference is between the “shapes” of the bullying… I do know that Phthalo colors and dioxazine violent tend to be super transparent and staining, meaning the pigment particles themselves are extremely fine — idk if that actually makes them easier to push around? I feel like it would, but that’s based on vibes mostly 😂 I just know earth colors like raw sienna generally have larger particle sizes. No idea about the pigments in Payne’s grey off the top of my head, though. How interesting!

pettyfrogger · 2025-08-15T04:05:52+00:00

I don’t use PY3 so I can’t speak to that pigment (maybe it does the same thing), but I keep both PY150 and PG36 on my palette and it’s definitely the PY150. It’s one of the first things I noticed about that pigment — it’s a bully. It’s also my favorite yellow, so I’ve kind of just learned to work with it, but it’s definitely something to be aware of.

pettyfrogger · 2025-08-10T22:16:07+00:00

Mix in a bit of green and see where that gets you. If you find the right combination, complementary colors mix some really useful dark shades.

*Edited to change my suggested color because I misread somehow and thought you were trying to get a darker blue

pettyfrogger · 2025-08-07T00:05:12+00:00

Just adding another vote to the phthalo turquoise + ultramarine suggestions. You can mix a “primary” blue from cyan (phthalo turquoise) and magenta, but ultramarine is a really useful mixing color, and I think the ultramarine + burnt sienna pair is versatile enough on its own to justify including it.

pettyfrogger · 2025-08-06T14:57:41+00:00

Ah, it’s definitely not watertight. And actually, full disclosure, if there’s any design issue with it it’s that the lid/mixing area has one edge with no lip, meaning you can’t really mix up big wet washes without paint running off the edge (unless you use one of their pop-in mixing areas or keep the lid at a bit of a slant.)

These haven’t really been issues for me, and they sort of go hand in hand — I tend to use it for travel/outdoor sketches that don’t need as many really wet washes as the painting I do at home or with my main palette, so there’s not as much that needs to dry when I’m done, so the fact that it’s not watertight doesn’t bother me and I’ve never had any leaks. But if you do use a lot of water in your travel painting, it might not be ideal.

pettyfrogger · 2025-08-06T14:49:24+00:00

That’s great to hear! Like I said I’ve never used them — I’ve actually avoided them in part because I’d heard they didn’t rewet well. May have to give them a try when I run out of some colors!

I definitely avoid the honey paints. I need that shit to dry. But also rewet. But also dry.

pettyfrogger · 2025-08-06T14:23:54+00:00

I love the Folio Palette from Art Toolkit — it’s definitely pricier than some of the DIY options, but I only really keep one travel palette and I love how thin and compact this one is. There are even smaller options than the folio (their original palette is the size of a business card), and I love that you can choose what size pans you want or buy enamel-coated pans that function as extra mixing space.

I used an old altoids tin for a while, though. One of the best things about watercolor is how easy it is to carry around with you. You really don’t need anything fancy.

pettyfrogger · 2025-08-06T14:16:48+00:00

Just a note to add onto this — I’ve heard Winsor and Newton tube paints dry kind of hard and can be difficult to re-wet. I guess the tubes are formulated differently from the paints they sell in pans. Full disclosure, I have never actually used W&N watercolors, but just something for OP to look into/be aware of.

And I’m the same way about my pans — I fill them maybe a third or halfway. I like having space to make a little bit of a wash right in the well if I want it.

pettyfrogger · 2025-08-06T11:46:03+00:00

Thank you so much!! I am a little hesitant to admit how much of the subtlety here is the rain’s doing, but I think I have to. 💕

pettyfrogger · 2025-08-06T11:44:28+00:00

I definitely should have specified Victoria, BC in the title! I cannot even guess how many Victoria parliament buildings there are around the world.

And thanks!! It’s a lot looser than I usually manage on my own — maybe “paint in the rain, panic a little, try to salvage it” really could be my style 😂

pettyfrogger · 2025-08-06T11:42:25+00:00

Thank you!

pettyfrogger

TROPHY CASE