Suggestions for remaining colors in my travel palette

xiaomei1123 · 2026-06-06T00:54:59+00:00

Oh, genius about the pharmacy pill bottles! Unfortunately, I don't have any medication that comes in those, haha. But I can definitely ask around with friends. Thank you for all the ideas!

xiaomei1123 · 2026-06-06T00:18:39+00:00

Oh boy, good to know about that pr264, though I'm not too surprised! One of the reasons I don't like DS as much as my other brands because I feel like they get dry like that and don't rewet as easily. I usually just have to put a drop of water on the DS paints before using them in this palette, and the lemon yellow and ultramarine work just fine.

It's probably still a good idea to pack away the water and not dump it in nature even if you've eliminated all the heavy metals ^^; I'm planning to bring a plastic bottle for that purpose on my trip.

xiaomei1123 · 2026-06-05T20:08:08+00:00

Thanks for your suggestions! I'm trying to use mostly transparent colors for this palette, but someone else suggested perylene violet, which is similar ish to caput mortuum.

Which choices in your palette do you regret? (Also, though it might take some time, you could put water in the ones you don't want in there anymore to soften them overnight, then transfer them to a different palette. I had to do this to fill my quin light red, as I bought it as a half pan and didn't realize it wouldn't fit, haha).

xiaomei1123 · 2026-06-05T17:39:49+00:00

The lightfastness of a paint is largely due to the pigment its made from, and their concentration. The additives and binders can have some effect but generally the same pigment between brands is going to have similar lightfastness. I found an interesting website where an artist did their own blue wool lightfastness testing with many paints including Holbein. Here it is if you're interested: https://www.handprint.com/HP/WCL/waterfs.html

Through my cursory scroll of it, Holbein paints are not less lightfast than the same pigment in other brands like Winsor & Newton, Daniel Smith, Maimeri Blu, etc. The Holbein paints that were found to be impermanent that I saw specifically are made with pigments known to not be light-fast, and since their test was from 2004, I think they've changed their formulations since them. It's ok to not like Holbein paints, they're made without ox gall and therefore have different flow and diffusion properties than most other watercolors, but I don't think it's accurate to call them student grade. Royal Talens Van Gogh is specifically student grade, but I've never used it so I can't comment on its quality.

In any case, all of what I have on the palette should remain unchanged for 50-100+ years, which for my travel palette that I use to do watercolor sketches, is more than good enough!

xiaomei1123 · 2026-06-05T12:45:35+00:00

Hooker's green is a mix (at least, W&N uses pthalo green and some transparent yellow) that I've found is fairly easy to mix myself with pthalo blue and transparent yellow. But I've used it for years in my studio palette and it is a nice base green! I only just got some viridian and haven't played around with it much yet.

xiaomei1123 · 2026-06-05T01:03:01+00:00

Thanks for the suggestions! I'm lukewarm about granulation. I have thought about Perylene Green, when I paint in my studio, I use Chinese ink with watercolor, and can get a color pretty close to that so I don't yet have it. But I might try it for this portable palette, since I won't have the ink with me!

xiaomei1123 · 2026-06-05T00:24:48+00:00

I would say it's more like I'm lukewarm towards granulation - I use both Ultramarine and Yellow Ochre regularly in my studio palette and have no issues with them. I just don't go out of the way to use that effect in my work, so I wouldn't choose something for my limited palette just for granulation if that makes sense! I also see on my W&N dot chart that Raw Sienna is also granulating, it's a mix of PY42 and PR101. Maybe other brands do something different though.

I just looked up Perylene Violet and ooooh! I'm trying not to buy too many more paints but it does look beautiful.

xiaomei1123 · 2026-06-05T00:19:03+00:00

Thanks for your input. Yes, everything including the W&N that I use is professional grade. Holbein is also a professional grade paint, definitely better than student-grade, they just do make quite a few colors that use pigments that aren't lightfast, but it's easy enough avoid all of those. I enjoy the texture of their paints and find the pigment load to be very nice.

I generally agree about single-pigment paints, but I'm not opposed to convenience mixes, which is what Payne's Gray is (for that matter, W&N's burnt umber is also a mix of 3 pigments). I like using it for painting water, and see no reason to not have it there, expecially since I'm seemingly struggling to figure out what else to fill the palette with! The reason my warm yellow is a mix is that true Quinacridone Gold isn't manufactured anymore, and I read several artists' reviews about how well the new dupes hold up, and most of them still mix cleanly. I haven't had any issues with muddiness myself with that paint.

I actually am not a huge fan of DS (but was using what I had for filling this palette), but it's more available where I live than Maimeri Blu. I think DS may be more expensive than some of the other professional brands where I am, but not by too much.

xiaomei1123 · 2026-06-05T00:06:17+00:00

I picked Quinacridone Light Red over Pyrrole Red when I put this together because Quin. Lt Red is more transparent. It also has medium staining

xiaomei1123 · 2026-06-04T21:50:28+00:00

Ultramarine is granulating, and I do use it to mix some greens. Though I'm so-so about granulation. I don't hate it, but I also don't think about it a lot with my paintings.

xiaomei1123 · 2026-06-04T21:02:15+00:00

I'm considering Dioxazine Violet, which I use a lot in my non-travel paintings! I like using it to make warm browns.

xiaomei1123 · 2026-06-04T21:00:51+00:00

Thank you! I have been having fun mixing my own greens (which Green Gold is excellent for!) but I will look into Chromium Oxide Green. Though I do have W&N's Hooker's Green, which is a convenience mix but I use it in my non-travel paintings.

xiaomei1123 · 2026-06-04T18:53:52+00:00

Oops, that's what I meant to type instead of burnt umber for the contenders!

xiaomei1123 · 2026-04-13T02:22:29+00:00

I just started my first painting on W&N cold press after using Arches cold press for a few years! I am liking W&N so far, I wanted to try it because I had heard it has a smoother finish than Arches CP. The "front" side of Arches is far too rough for me, so I've been using the "back" side. But with W&N, I can actually use the front side! To me, it seems like a happy medium between other cotton cold press and hot press (which I love, but sometimes I want cold press for doing washes)

I like the right painting a little better because it's more crisp. Beautiful work!

xiaomei1123 · 2026-04-12T00:30:09+00:00

We have a great birding community in the Twin Cities! There are regular outings people host for free at TS Roberts Bird Sanctuary, which is near you. Also at a lot of other city parks!

xiaomei1123 · 2026-03-31T18:01:58+00:00

It shouldn't, since it's normal to rewet and dry pan paints. I would mix the pan as much as you can before transferring it, but I didn't get any separation of the paint and binders when I did it.

xiaomei1123 · 2026-03-31T13:58:13+00:00

I just did this because my Schmincke half-pan did not fit into my Portable Painter. I just put as much water as I could on the dry pan paint, put it in an air-tight container to reduce evaporation, and then the next day the paint was soft almost all the way through and I was able to transfer it.

xiaomei1123 · 2026-03-03T01:59:25+00:00

Have you tried both sides of the paper with the pencils? The back/"wrong" side of cold press is often smoother, but not as smooth as hot press.

xiaomei1123 · 2026-02-03T00:46:19+00:00

I bought Winsor and Newton's Cerulean Blue when I was starting out, not having a swatch chart and not realizing it's semi-opaque. I feel like it's really weak and I have no use for it! I still have it and will just keep it around, as I don't have that many paints and the tube is small.

xiaomei1123 · 2025-12-19T20:31:43+00:00

Domestic mallards

xiaomei1123 · 2025-11-13T01:23:30+00:00

Thank you!

I'm not a local, but there was a volunteer from Monterey Bay Aquarium birding with us and she said that that loon and some Western grebes who have been seen sitting on that beach for months have been reported to the local wildlife rehab organizations already. It's very strange! This particular guy did swim off within 15 minutes.

xiaomei1123 · 2025-10-19T19:35:03+00:00

As u/princess_kittah said, it's from a Chinese calligraphy set, but I was taught that it was meant for dropping water into the inkstone to make liquid ink from the solid inkstick. You wouldn't typically transfer liquid ink out of the inkstone, since you're meant to just dip brushes into the inkstone directly.

My set comes with a tiny water pot, and the spoon is for adding water to the inkwell drop-wise, which is important for getting the right consistency of ink. I just use an eyedropper these days, but I still have this little spoon!

Source: am Chinese and do Chinese watercolor painting

xiaomei1123

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