A little trip prep - pens and palette

December 9, 2013 | Leave your thoughts


This is part of my usual ‘trip prep’… the crazy stuff I do as I prepare for a ‘big’ trip (and no, I haven’t shared where I am going yet)
One of the most important trip prep is deciding what art supplies I will take…and since I was testing all my pens out last month using the smooth paper of a Stillman & Birn Zeta sketchbook I thought I would try them all on a rougher surface (the Beta book) and see how they go.

I am liking the green sailor pen a lot… though wish it flowed better when I use the pen at rapid speed.
I did this page on the train so it is a little rough!

New latest palette… paint is drying (and might get topped up a little)
I always clean my palette (with eucalyptus oil) and make fresh pans at the start of a trip. Not the cleanest or neatest pans I have made as I am trying to rest my sketching hand at the moment and squeezing pan tubes was hard work!

And here are the colours….
All Daniel Smith paints UNO (and architectural term I haven’t used for a year = unless noted otherwise)

Hansa yellow medium
Transparent pyrrol orange
Carmine
Imperial Purple (total convenience mix)
Ultramarine Blue
Cerulean Blue Chromium ( more vibrant than usual CB – better for australian skies)
Pthalo Blue (red shade)
Indanthrone Blue
“Steels Grey” (my premix of WN Cobalt Deep Blue and Quin Burnt Orange…an idea I got from Jane Blundell)
Transparent Red Oxide (crazy reactive alternative to Burnt Sienna)
Raw umber (gorgeous cool brown very different from other raw umbers)
Monte Amiata Natural Sienna (an alternative to raw sienna but more transparent)
WN Cobalt Turquoise Light
Green Apatite Genuine (crazy colour – don’t use much)
WN Potters Pink  (granulating colour, mutes colours )
Quin Gold (makes beautiful Australian greens)

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