Greys Palette Workshop 24

This is the palette that I mixed for Workshop 24. Lovely to have a range of close-ish hues and matching values. I'd pick from these piles to work into my mixing palette for the painting. When I was finished, I put the left-overs into the freezer ready for the next painting.

2 members like this

View Full Size

Tags:
Albums: Workshop24

Add a Comment

You need to be a member of The Complete Artist to add comments!

Join The Complete Artist

Comment by Lori Ippolito on August 7, 2013 at 5:57: I use the disposable gray from richeson as well - i like the neutral value for the background and the surface is great..so much better than any wood or plastic palette I've tried.

I also have a sheet of plexiglass i keep on top of my rolling cabinet..that's easy to clean -and I often put a value scale underneath to help me- I put leftover paints on a sheet of tin foil & pop into the freezer for saving. I've also saved paints in little glass jars -- scrape paint in, fill with water (oil & water don't mix, soalett paints stay good as new)..when ready to use again, just dump the water & scrape out the paints!

Comment by Lori Ippolito on August 7, 2013 at 5:51: this appeals to the Virgo in me!!! lol...great job & so neat!!!

Comment by Stuart J. Gourlay on August 7, 2013 at 1:00: To Michael Chomse. When I come back from painting outdoors, I pick up remaining unmixed piles of paint with a palette knife and transfer them onto my studio palette. Another way to save money on paint is by using a limited palette and mixing most of your colors. Michael Severin will tell you that if you make a lot of color charts using a palette knife, you will get a lot better at both color mixing and with painting with your palette knife. Stu

Comment by Stuart J. Gourlay on August 7, 2013 at 0:53: Michael, I got this idea from Tom Soltesz, a full time artist here in Marin; Tom has used this in his pochade boxes for over 20 years. The polyurethane floor varnish is really durable, but linseed oil should work. The gesso was a neutral gray from Liquitex; you could mix your own from some black and whit gessos. The idea is to have a mid value neutral background to evaluate your colors against. Stu

Comment by Michael Chomse on August 7, 2013 at 0:47: Stu, I was finding, because I'm new at this, that I was mixing too much paint and then throwing it away at the end of a painting session. I don't have a lot of cash for this, so that burned... I also had trouble matching the colours that I had previously mixed. I found that with this method both those problems were solved exceptionally well.

Comment by Michael J. Severin on August 7, 2013 at 0:00: Stu, I recently took the glass out of my pochade box too lesson the weight. I put "tons" of linseed oil on the wood to seal it. Is that good enough, or do I need to put the polyurethane on? Also, when you painted the mid value, did you use white gesso and put black paint in it?

Comment by Stuart J. Gourlay on August 6, 2013 at 15:49: You guys are really making this complicated. I am with Silvana; my palette is a mess. I like a mid-value grey background and use disposable grey paper palettes from Jack Richeson; they work well for studio painting. For outdoor painting I finished the plywood bottom of my pochade box with a midvalue grey gesso and put about 10 or twelve layers of spray on polyurethane varnish on it with light sanding between coats; it is like glass and I scrape it with a palette knife and clean it with OMS after using it. It adds almost no weight, won't break and gives me a neutral background for my colors when the light is glaring outdoors. When my palette gets junked up I either throw away the paper or scrape and wipe either the paper or the bottom of my pochade box. I use the blue shop towels tather than kitchen paper towels because they shed less lint. For my cotton rags I use discarded (unused) laparotomy tapes left over after surgery (one of the side benefits of being a surgeon); these are lint free and very absorbent and have a twill cotton loop on one corner that I can hang off my pochade box or studio easel. Stu

Comment by Ann Turner on August 6, 2013 at 13:11: Thank you Michael for sharing your grey palette. I like the idea of 2 palettes one to keep the good stuff for use and away from the working palette where I cross contaminate often. I enjoy your paintings with your unique style.

Comment by Michael Chomse on August 6, 2013 at 10:45: Silvana - It is glass. This works for me because I work on a white table.

I have two palettes that I work on. This one is the one that I transfer my mixed colours to. It is like the storage palette. The other one is the one that I mix on and paint from, and as you can imagine that one gets messy. When I finish a section from that palette, and if there is paint left over, I transfer it to to this one. Then, later, if I see that I need to adjust something, I have the remainder of the colour to hand.

It seems to be quite a process, but it works for me.

I had this glass sheet cut to fit exactly into a Tupperware. Then when I am finished painting for the day, I put the palette into the tupperware, seal it tight and put it in the freezer. The paints stay wet and fresh, for up to two weeks. (The earth colours, the umbers and so on, harden after about ten days).

Comment by Silvana M Albano on August 6, 2013 at 10:15: Michael! You really are a very neat person! My palette looks just horrible and the one sticks to the other! Is that glass where you are putting your oils?