Color

Print Munsell color with your printer - PDF

Munsell Color Charts PDF to print at Home

“Thank you for making this product available,it’s very useful!” Florent Farges – www.florentfarges.com Color references are often very pricey. In my blog post “Save hundreds on studio equipment!” I showed you how I made my own color charts. In the end this can literally save you hundreds of (insert your currency here). And in “Mixing Neutrals” I showed how I made a neutral value scale based on my Munsell color chips from the Munsell Student book. In the blog post “Munsell 101 for the Artist” I explain … Read more

Save hundreds on studio equipment! Color charts on a budget

Save 781.50€ on studio equipment!…..What? Recently I talked about the Munsell color system which in brief is a system based on the three qualities of color – hue, value and chroma which helps you in judging color. As an artist you will need to know what colors to mix for your subject and which paints to choose to mix these specific colors. And here comes a color catalogue in handy. While there are some painters who have the Munsell Book of Color* the old masters only … Read more

Instructional video by Douglas Flynt

I recently wrote about Scott Waddell’s new instructional video “Drawing & Painting” and considered it as very valuable since it is packed with lots of information. Two days later I found Douglas Flynt’s instructional video which somehow went under my radar since it is available for over 2 months now. With $39.95 (~29€) for 74 minutes it is about the same as Scott’s video. And it has the same information density – if not even more! I also wrote about the Munsell color system recently … Read more

Munsell 101 for the artist

Color theory – a little physics for the artist For me color theory was always a boring topic. With my background as a lab technician I knew about the wavelengths of light and how the eye perceives color. But this did not help me learning to see and mix color. But here are the basics: There are different types of color models and most of them are organized in a circle. Color is a visual sensation of electro magnetic waves. The eye is the organ that … Read more

Mixing Munsell neutrals

Having some neutral values at hand is very handy. You can use them for a value scale or to mix with higher chroma colors (of the same value) to make them more neutral. If you have problems judging the value of a high chroma color squint your eyes. I’ve got the Munsell student book*, and it contains the Munsell neutrals scale. But the problem with the matte chips from the book is, that you can not place paint dabs onto it and whipe it off … Read more

Do not save on the wrong things

I recently received an oil paint set with 12 different colors as a gift. This set of tubes was sold at a very low price for around 3€ so I was curious about the paint’s quality and as I expected, the quality is very low. Although this blog is also about saving money with your classical art studies I don’t recommend these types of paint. Because if you save on the wrong things you’ll propably pay twice. Maybe these paints are sufficient for making color exercises … Read more

The white of an eye is not white!

A mistake a lot of beginners make is to draw or paint the image that they have in their mind instead of replicating what’s in front of them. But painting a realistic image means to replicate reality and not a stereotype image. Look closely and learn to transfer it to the canvas. Here is a little example: This is one of my first attempts in painting many, many years ago. You can see – besides all the other mistakes I have made – that I … Read more

Low budget glass palette

You propably know the traditional wooden palettes that artists use – on one hand they hold their brushes and on the other is a wooden palette resting on the forearm, secured by the thumb through a hole. Read on and learn about the advantages of a Glass Palette and how you can get one for little money. There are certain disadvantages with these hand held wooden palettes: Color: The color of wood is not neutral therefore all your mixed colors will be influenced by this. … Read more