Mauve-ember materials and highlights

I used Angelus leather paint (new favorite) on top of some old art that I gesso’d over.

A quick break with a mauve Tombow marker (817) and gouache while running errands:

I used a mauve Neocolor ii for the shutters in this drawing I made from Google Maps. You can watch the whole process for this one at the end of the video, along with all my favorite materials to use with mauve!

Shoutout to , whose research rabbit hole inspired my art for this post!

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Allow me to introduce you to some of my current favorite color palettes inspired by the season of transition:

Prompt: Make some color palettes!

There’s no pressure to make a masterpiece. Imagine all your art supplies jumping and yelling “pick me! pick me!” You’ll feel powerful!

Can you guess which palettes I used in this drawing?

Below the paywall, you’ll find the process by which I made the drawing. Enjoy!

You heard it here first: we are officially in Mauve-ember1

Mauve seems to be loosely interpreted across the many brands of art supplies, which excites me about using this color. Some are more muted pink, while others lean toward violet.

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Fun ways to use the color black:

Capture the lushness of nature without green.

Using only red, yellow, and black paint1 (and a pencil), I made a little series of drawings at the Atlanta Botanical Gardens.

Use black for line work with limited materials.

After our session with Nishant Jain, I was so inspired that I grabbed the first pencil I saw and started drawing!

Mix and layer to create your own!

I had a lovely time mixing indigo, red, and yellow ochre watercolor to create the most magical chromatic spots and details! Use red, yellow, and blue, or a pair of complementary colors and you can’t go wrong.

Thanks for reading and Happy Halloween!

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Join me on the dark side!

• Create some magnificent chromatic black swatches and post them in the chat to inspire us!

• Share your favorite paints, inks, pencils, crayons, and all things black!

• Catch up on replays

Tag me in your wonderful work on Instagram at @bethspencerart so I can share!

Materials

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Let’s pretend I’m planning a magnificent dinner party for all of you. It’s my responsibility to taste test all the food before serving it to you, especially the cakes.

Color Testing Tips

• No drawing allowed. This is the only time I’ll ever make that rule. This is about how the colors look and layer together. As you can see from my color tests, I’m a rule breaker.

• Work small. It will save you loads of time and paper. I can usually fit four color tests on the top half of a page of printer paper.

• Don’t overthink materials. Dry materials are perfect, even if you plan to use paint at a later stage.

It’s a great idea to color test when:

• you’re stuck.

• working on a book project or series of illustrations.

• you’ve sketched your artwork and aren’t sure what you want to do next.

• you simply want to have some fun with materials before coloring an illustration!

Prompt:

Create a set of color tests for a future piece of art, illustration, or design!

In the video:

I share my color tests using this set of Kuretake watercolors (shoutout to for that magical discovery), along with some of my struggles as I navigate this series of Gone Wild Fairy Tales illustrations!

Want personal feedback on using color in your art?

More from our Gone Wild Fairy Tale series:

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I can’t wait to see the wonderful burnt orange beauty we create this month!

• Create your own palettes and post them in the chat to inspire us!

• Mix your own burnt orange and share what you used!

• Catch up on replays

🧡 Tag me in your wonderful work on Instagram at @bethspencerart so I can share!

Materials

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Here are some ways I used Payne’s Grey!

Sketching around midtown Atlanta with Luminance Pencils:

I mixed with pink, yellow and Payne’s Grey Inktense Pencil to draw this raccoon & ladybug in my friend TJ Marston’s session:

I used Payne’s Grey Pan pastel, Inktense Paint set #2, and a pencil for this one:

Here’s what I love about Payne’s Grey:

• It’s muted. It gives me permission to use a VERY punchy color.

• It’s lovely to sketch with. You draw of details down with a Payne’s Grey pencil, then layer splashes of fun colors.

• It make gorgeous greens! Try it with Sherbet Lemon Inktense pencil or block and you’ll see what I mean.

  

How do you like to use Payne’s Grey?

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Things I like about them:

• Refillable - Buy replacements or fill them with your own paint!

• Affordable - Compared to other palettes, these are a steal at around $20 each.

• Lovely Layering - They play and mix well with other materials too!

I’ve been drawing with them all week, so you can see how they differ, in case you’ve been eyeing them.

Palette 2

I painted these lions on Monday using Palette 2, which is full of strong, saturated colors. It also includes a pan of white paint, which is almost useless. I recommend ditching it, then filling the empty pan with white gouache if you choose this set.

Line & Wash Set

I drew these lions using the Line & Wash set from the same reference image, which is a still from a zoolife1 webcam, If you want a mix of saturated and muted colors at your fingertips, this is the set for you. It’s like a tasty sampler platter!

Graphitint Set

If you’re like me and tend to lean on bold colors for impact, the Graphitint set will challenge you in all the right ways (not a single bright color in the set). It’s also extremely fun to use with other materials, like Neocolors or hard pastels.

Palette 1

Loaded with saturated colors, Palette 1 is excellent if you want to practice mixing. I love layering these paints. Watch the video for some sweet examples!

That was fun! What’s your take on these paint palettes?

Shoutout to , who let me try hers last May. And to for asking me about them last week!

👯‍♂️ Speaking of fun… we have two sessions next week!

One with the almighty and friends, then we’ll draw Awkward Cat Portraits on Friday. Sign up below!

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It’s an additional tier of Introvert Drawing Club where we dive deeper into color, materials, and process!

When you join Color Club, I’ll review your recent art and send you a a custom color consultation, which includes:

💛 Color-centric Feedback Video - Advice to build palettes that reflect the colors you love and use in your art.

❤️ Custom Assignment - …

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How to make bold and clear colours, even if your paintbox looks like this.

I get away with a feral, scungy palette because of the colours I choose, and how I choose them. Today, I’m going to show how to use a messy, limited watercolour palette to create clear and bold colours.

This is ok. I promise.

This post is long-ish and a little bit technical, so maybe make yourself a cup of coffee. I’ll still be here when you get back.

The case for simplicity

To me, it’s kind of wild that every colour derives from just red, yellow and blue. It seems like it shouldn’t work. Nothing else is like that. There aren’t “primary sounds”, and you can’t make every food out of “primary tastes”.

Using just three primary colours is a Very Good Plan. It does so much good:

Decision making is simple - you only have one kind of orange to use, red+yellow

* It ties the painting together. Everything is made of the same things so there are no weird spots where colours stand out, and stops you from making muddy colours. And if you use it throughout a sketchbook, it ties the whole book together.

* You learn faster. Keeping the same palette, you work out what the colours can and can’t do quickly.

Despite all this, companies still make ridiculous palettes with 48 colours. You don’t need them.

You won’t use them all anyway. It’s like a Chinese restaurant; even though the menu has 437 dishes, I get the same meal every time. Too much choice is overwhelming.

But the menu isn’t the palette. In the kitchen, a series of containers holds vegetables, proteins, and sauces. Maybe I was wrong before, and there are primary ingredients?

But.. there are different primary ingredients for different cuisines. A Chinese restaurant has no business with salami and cheese; too many primary ingredients spoil the menu..

It’s the same with paints. Zillions of colours give you decision fatigue and weird, mixed-up paintings, like the strange plates of food that happen at mega buffets.

So here’s how to simplify!

How I choose and use a limited watercolour palette

Choose your fighters:

You only need three. But which three? There are hundreds of colours.

The key is to learn to read the tubes: every tube of artist-quality watercolour paint, whatever the brand, will have an ingredients list. It tells you what kind of floaties are in the paint, with a pigment number.

For example, Payne's grey is already a mixture.

For each of these, the P means Pigment, the next letter means the colour, and the number is which colour.

PB15 = Pigment that is Blue, number 15.

It also has black and violet pigments in it too.

Remember being four years old, bunging all the paints together in one place and making mud? The more things you mix together, the muddier it gets, so I find single-pigment paints are a better choice for mixing.

Another thing that matters to me is transparency, which some brands show with a square: colours with just the outline are transparent and colours with a filled-in square are opaque.

Finally, I want colours that are as saturated as possible. Bright and bold - you can always tone them down, but you can’t go the other way.

Looking for these three attributes, my main triad is :

French ultramarine (PB29) Magenta (PV42) Transparent yellow (azo-nickel yellow) (PY150)

There are plenty of other triads that work. I mostly paint street scenes and urban environments. If you’re painting desert landscapes, you might prefer a different triad.

A triad is a system; the three colours work as a team. To see how the team interacts, make a triangle.

Make a triangle

Everyone tells you to make your colours into a wheel, but I like to make a triangle.

Put the primaries in the corners, then mix them to get the secondaries in the middle. You can create in between colours too, and see the full range of colours that these three primaries can make.

The colour triangle acknowledges that there are colours beyond what you can make. You cannot mix Fluorescent Orange from these paints.

A different triad will make different colours possible. Not better or worse, but different.

When you make these triangles, you’ll work out what colours are possible. The triangle becomes a handy reference when you’re painting later on.

A word of warning. I don’t know of a “perfect” triad that does everything. My favourite triad is missing a good fire-engine red, but I am willing to sacrifice this because of the amazing purples that magenta makes. Whatever you choose, there will be tradeoffs.

Dance in the space

When I’m mixing colours with a triad like this, I think about where I am on a colour triangle, and where I want to go.

If you’re trying to make a colour, have your best guess, then test it on a scrap of paper. This helps because it’s hard to tell what a colour looks like in the palette.

If a colour is “wrong” you have only 4 options: add water, red, blue or yellow. Adding water will make it lighter, and adding a colour will move you toward that colour in the triangle.

If it’s too orange, add a little blue. If it’s too red, add some blue and yellow. If the purple is too purple, add yellow. A little practice and you’ll get it.

If there’s a colour that you need that you can’t make, just chill out. Matching the colours exactly doesn’t matter. If you’re in the right neighbourhood and the values are pretty close, the picture will work.

Thinking about colours by mapping it to where I am in a shape helps me organise my thoughts. Each colour is a point in space, instead of a vague “orangey dark brown”

Make your own black.

For me, the real test of a triad is how dark you can go. Watercolours are always diluted so you’re limited by your darkest paint. This is almost always your blue.

My normal recipe for black or a neutral colour is lots of blue, some red, and a bit of yellow. Once you’re there, you can push things around the colour triangle a little, and get some amazing neutral colours. Pushing toward blue to get greys, towards yellow and red to get browns. They all look way more interesting than tube blacks, which look dead and lifeless in comparison.

It’s hard to capture the beauty of homemade neutrals in a scan. They look even better in real life.

You can get the same kinds of variation in any colour. Look how beautiful and unified these colours look. They’re family.

Using transparent, single pigment primaries simplifies your approach, unifies your paintings, and as a bonus, it costs less, because you don’t need all those other colours. That’s more money for chocolate (or fancy paper, which is actually the most important piece of watercolour gear).

The even bigger bonus is you can be a gross gremlin like me and never have to clean your palette again. If you have opaque colours, they contaminate each other, and you’ve gotta be a bit cleaner to get bright colours. All the transparent colours work together, always. You’re just starting your dance in the colour triangle from a different spot.

Limit yourself. Turns out that restrictions are freedom

Happy painting. Make some triangles. I’d love to see them.

Andrew

P.S. You can also use a helper colour, but that can be a bit problematic and life is simpler without them. My helper colours are Prussian blue, cerulean blue, cadmium red light and raw sienna.

Be sure to visit Andrew at and subscribe!

Basic tips for working with blue.

• Cerulean is cool blue, because it’s closer to green on the color wheel. It’s true that all blues are cool, but they make one that’s cooler just to confuse us.

• Ultramarine is warm blue, because it’s closer to red on the color wheel. If you want to mix purple, that’s THE blue to use!

• You don’t need to know how to say “Phthalocyanine.” At least not to be a member of this club. I’ll never quiz you on it.

I love using blue to draw gorillas the most.

What’s your favorite use for the color blue?

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There’s no denying RED is the hottest, most traffic-stopping primary color. You may associate our warmest primary with hanger, angry, heat, or other harsh emotions.

Red didn't ask for any of these negative connotations! It's time to give it the respect it deserves as our most dramatic primary color.

I’d like to remind you that red is also responsible for:

Knowing how intense a pure red can be, I usually make sure to surround it with muted, less saturated colors.

I used red by itself once and that worked out nicely:

Would this badge have the same impact if it were turquoise?

I ❤️ red. It’s an important color and deserves a place in your palette, pencil case, or wherever you stash your favorite art supplies!

Related Videos

The Fiery Punch of Vermillion

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When I saw how many folks voted YELLOW as their least favorite color, I didn’t sleep for a week. 🙀 It’s a staple in my palette and makes up so many magnificent color mixtures! Read on and warm up to my most-beloved primary color!

Here are some ways to use yellow:

Sketch in yellow. It’s the lightest primary, so it’s easy to draw and paint on top of.

Lighten and brighten your art without washing it out. Do you usually reach for white paint to lighten and tint colors? Next time, try Naples yellow! Or add a tiny bit of gamboge to your white, then lighten away!

Start with a big blob of yellow. Sometimes I’m not sure where to start drawing, so I’ll just swirl light yellow paint on a page and fill in details on top. It makes for a warm, harmonious underpainting. shared a stunning illustration demonstrating the warmth a yellow underpainting can bring in Primary July chat thread yesterday!

I made an exercise to help us get to know our yellows!

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Grab all your yellows, reds, and blues and get ready to fall in love with layering and mixing!

Here are my parameters:

💛 No secondary-colored materials allowed. I’ll only use orange, green, purple, etc. if I’ve mixed them from primary colors.

❤️ Mix and/or layer in every drawing. That’s where the learning happens, specifically proportions in mixing!

💙 Draw from life, camera roll, or imagination. I’ve already broken that rule because I drew a fox from a wildlife field guide. Oops!

That’s what I’m doing, but make this challenge work for you.

If you make something and think “that could use a splash of turquoise. I have the perfect crayon for that,” go for it! It’s your practice.

Here are the three videos for this magical month of color mixing:

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All are welcome to participate. I’ll share supplies, practice prompts, tips, and detailed process videos in our Introvert Drawing Club member chat!

This month’s primary color theme ties into a BIG BIG announcement…

What is Color Club?

It’s an additional tier of Introvert Drawing Club where we dive deeper into color, materials, and process! When you join Color Club, I’ll review your recent art and send you a a custom color consultation, which includes:

💛 Color-centric Feedback Video - Advice to build palettes that reflect the colors you love and use in your art.

❤️ Custom Assignment - Create a piece of art that expands your color-mixing practice.

💙 Color Magic Zine - Sent to you in the mail!

I can only accommodate FIVE folks right now. I hope to increase this soon and eventually add in a quarterly color-centric session so lots of us can mix and play together!

UPDATE: We’re all filled up, but you can join the waitlist and I’ll email you when some spots open!

Join the waitlist

A simple mix of yellow and blue gives us this gorgeous greenish-yellow color.

Remember to mix WAY more yellow than blue.

Chartreuse is a secondary color.

Since we only use two primary colors (yellow & blue) to mix chartreuse, the law of the almighty color wheel tells us it is a secondary color, like purple and green.

Its complementary color1 is red-violet, which means they pair well together, like chips and salsa!

Chartreuse needs a friend.

Even though it’s a vibrant, punchy color, it’s not quite dark enough for details. I’ve had a nice time pairing it with indigo and reddish browns, so it’s able to shine in all its yellowy-green glory!

In the video

I share sketchbooks, process timelapse, materials I’m loving, artists using chartreuse masterfully, and real-life creative challenges. At the end, I go over a simple way to add your own handwritten text to your illustrations, which kindly requested a few months back!

Share with us in the chat and check out more color videos here!

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I love indigo, in all its moody darkness, but let’s look at some other ways we can work with this cool blue hue.

Mixing the dreamiest greens you’ve ever seen.

Yellow and indigo combine to create magical greens like what you’re seeing behind the lions below.

Creating chromatic blacks

You can layer it on top of orange to create stunning chromatic blacks that’ll make your heart skip a beat.

Mute it and dilute it

I muted indigo with white gouache to start the coffee shop sketch, then went full intensity for the dark areas. Aren’t the textures delicious?

Want to see diluted indigo in action?

In the video, watch how I build layers of liquid watercolor to create the owl illustration below.

It’s fun to play with a new color you don’t use every day.

I can’t wait to see which color you vote for next month!

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It needs the support of calmer colors, like yellow ochre or warm grey, to truly shine. This gives our eyes breathing room, so we’re not blasted with electric pink!

A few facts about Opera

Scanners can’t capture it’s vibrance. You’re better off photographing your art in natural light.

You can’t mix Opera from primary colors. The closest you might get is using magenta and red, but they won't give you Opera's brilliant glow.

It’s usually not lightfast. It’ll likely fade over time, so consider that before using it for gifts or commissions.

Mixing Opera into your practice

Less is more. If you're working straight from the tube, use WAY less than you think you need.

Consider white space. Imagine if I wrote this Substack post in all caps without line breaks. It would be a nighmare to read! Our eyes need white space, and this also applies to art and illustrations.

Add Opera at the very end. It's so tempting to start with the fun, punchy colors, but save those ultra-saturated pigments for the end. Start with lighter, more muted colors. You’ll be glad you did!

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Olive, a deliciously dirty green, is so easy to create using colors you already have that you don’t even need to buy fancy supplies.

Add a little red to your favorite green and it dirties the mixture, resulting in an olive green that dreams are made of. I dive deeper into that in the video.

Adding orange to your green will give you a similar effect. Try it with your favorite art materials, or even with ones you don’t like!

In the video I share:

• ways to mix and adjust olive using gouache

• tons of materials

• a process for painting a pet portrait of my dogs from a few terrible photos of them

Materials & Mentions

• Seeing Things Differently

• More Color Videos!

• Daniel Smith Watercolor

• Holbein Greenish Yellow Watercolor

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Because it’s muted, lavender has a wonderful way of letting other colors show off.

Lavender is like an aromatic in a soup. It might not be the dominant flavor, but it allows the main ingredients to shine.

Prompt: Mix your own version of lavender using your favorite materials!

• white

• ultramarine blue / or violet

• (optional) tiniest bit of magenta (adjust to your liking)

Here are the drawings I made in the video.

Favorites

• Daniel Smith Lavender Watercolor

• I also used the Lagoon Inktense pencil for a lot of my line work this month. It’s about as purple as a blue can get without being violet.

• Liquitex Marker in light blue violet

• Sky Blue Neocolor ii

• Ecoline Ultramarine Violet

• Canson sketchbook

• There are more color videos here!

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