A Well Rounded Watercolor Palette

THE COLORS ON MY PALETTE

Here is a list of the watercolors that always seem to be on my palette.  I often have other colors that I call my “guest colors” that come and go but the ones listed below are my favorite. 

COLOR	BRAND	NOTES	SUBSTITUTE COLOR
Lemon Yellow	D.S.	Good cool yellow	Hansa Yellow Med.
Phthalo Yellow Green	D.S.	Bright spring green	Cadmium Green Pale
Rich Green Gold	D.S.	Mix with blues and yellows for greenery
Phthalo Green YS	D.S.
Phthalo Turquoise	D.S.	Great for making darks
Cobalt Blue Teal	D.S.	Good “Pop” color
Cerulean	D.S. or W.N.	Manganese Blue/ good for skies & foliage
Cobalt Blue	W.N. or D.S.	Good for skies
Phthalo Blue RS	D.S.	Great for making darks and adding to foliage
French Ultramarine	D.S. or W.N.	The warmest blue
Carbazole Violet	D.S.	Good for adding to shadows	Cobalt Violet Deep
Quinacridone Violet	D.S. or W.N.	Good shadow color	Permanent Magenta
Permanent Rose	W.N.	Quinacridone Rose/ good for flowers
Permanent Red	D.S. or W.N.	True red	Winsor Red
Permanent Orange	D.S.	Good for flowers
Quinacridone Burnt Orange	D.S.	Good earth tone
Quinacridone Gold	D.S.	Stone wall, mixes well to make greens
New Gamboge	D.S.		Indian Yellow
D.S. = Daniel Smith; W.N. = Winsor Newton

Artists Stocking Stuffer Ideas

Here is another new addition to my watercolor palette.  Quinacridone Violet!


It is a rich, transparent color that mixes well with blues and reds or can be used on its own.  

Artists Stocking Stuffer Ideas

A new color on my palette is Schmincke Horadam Aquarell Translucent Orange.  I absolutely love this color!  It mixes well with yellows and reds and is beutiful on it's gorgeous on it's own.


Translucent Orange is considered a transparent color and has excellent lightfastnest meaning that it doesn't fade over time.  It is a great color for painting flowers!

Artist Stocking Stuffer Ideas

Since the holiday season is upon us, I thought it would be fun to share a few of my watercolor paints that I have recently added to my palette.  Any one of these colors would make a great stocking stuffer for the watercolor artist.  You can drop a hint to Santa by sharing this post!
Today's color idea is:  FRENCH VERMILION by Sennelier. 




"The word vermilion came from the Old French word vermeillon, which was derived from vermeil, from the Latin vermiculus, the diminutive of the Latin word vermis, or worm.  The name originated because it had a similar color to the natural red dye made from an insect, the Kermes vermilio, which was widely used in Europe. The term cinnabar was used interchangeably with vermilion until the 17th century, when vermilion became the more common name. By the late 18th century 'cinnabar' applied to the unground natural mineral only."  

Gift Ideas

Did you know that my art work is featured on lots of fun, cool gift ideas with FineArtAmerica? Not only can you buy prints and canvas paintings but they also offer my art on pillows, notebooks, iPhone cases, towels, totes, coffee mugs and much more!  Even shower curtains!  If there is a painting that you would like to see added please contact me.  Check it out!

Watercolor Journeys

My updated, self-published book, Watercolor Journeys, has just been reprinted.  It is now 70 pages of watercolor, painting and art journaling information.  This conveniently sized, spiral-bound gem is full of color photos, information on color theory and how to use color in your paintings, fun exercises, examples of my travel art journals, tips, inspiring art quotes, and much more.

Here are a few pages from my book:

Watercolor Journeys is $22 plus shipping. 

Here are just a few emails that I have received about my book:

"Wow! What a treasure! I love it! You need to expand on it and publish it big time! What a gorgeous book and filled with great information and beautiful artwork!" ..... Lynn

"I just wanted to follow up with you...I LOVEthe book, I have been pouring over it and working on the lessons - I feel like they should be called "workshops", they have proven to be so productive and interesting for me. Your careful, organized, right-to-the-point explanations and ideas to try out the concepts (especially color mixing, love the chickens:-) has been very helpful, fillling in the holes in my watercolor education. I am having so much fun with it, and not feeling any of the tentativeness or anxiety around the outcome as I have in the past." .....Jeanne

 "Got the book today and I do indeed love it!  I've already taken a couple of ideas from it for my travel journal [my palette and colour wheel] and will take your book to Italy with me."    .....Lori 

"I received your book today, and absolutely LOVE it!!!  So much so, that I just ordered 2 more, to go along with the additional copies of the DVDs that I purchased."   .....Cori

To order your copy, please click on the BUY  NOW button to the right.

Painting in Italy, 2018!

Join me on this fun adventure to Orvieto, Italy! 

I am very excited to present my watercolor workshop with Adventures in Italy Painting the Italian light and color!  One of my favorite things to do is to teach how I create visual journals of my travels using watercolors.  Orvieto, the charming Italian village perched on a rock, is the perfect place to spend our week together.  We will enjoy colorful painting time, tasty food delights, wine tasting, exploring the rich culture and history of the area, shopping, and relaxing in the quiet gardens of our Italian home.  Umbria is rich with sights, sounds, and colors – all wonderful inspiration for developing your artistic eye.  

on this fresh morning

"it is a serious thing
 just to be alive
 on this fresh morning
 in this broken world"

― Mary Oliver, Red Bird

So here is beauty to add to your fresh morning!

"There are things you can't reach" by Mary Oliver

“There are things you can’t reach. But

You can reach out to them, and all day long.

The wind, the bird flying away. The idea of god.

And it can keep you busy as anything else, and happier.

I look; morning to night I am never done with looking.

Looking I mean not just standing around, but standing around
As though with your arms open.”

by Mary Oliver

New Watercolor Palette Loaded and Ready to Paint!

I finally made the choices for 40 colors on my new watercolor palette!
I made a color chart for each color.  I always recommend making a color chart of the colors on your palette because sometimes you can't really tell what the color looks like sitting there in the well.

On my chart I list the manufacturer as well.  Then I get the chart laminated a Staples so that it will hold up and not fall apart if it gets wet.  I abbreviate the manufacturer names as follows:
Daniel Smith = DS
Winsor Newton = WN
Sennelier = Senn.
Holbein = HB
Schmincke = Schmin.
I hope you can read the chart that I made shown in these photos. 

Working my Way Around the Color Wheel

I am using my color wheel to pick my colors to go on my new palette.  I went from my yellows to oranges, reds, purples, blues and now finally greens.  I weeded out lots of colors that are too similar or that don't interest me by using my little color swatches that I painted (see previous posts).  It is time to start laying out the tubes of paint in the order that matches the colors on the color wheel.

More About Yellow Watercolors

I like to make a color swatch of each color.  This takes some time but it is fun to do!  You can learn a lot about your colors this way.  I start by cutting pieces of watercolor paper 3" x 1.5".

I write the name of the color and the manufacturer of the paint on the back side of the paper.  Then I wet the front of the paper and paint it.  I try to have lay the color on thick and thin to see how dark it can get.  When it is dry I write the name of the paint on the front of the paper.

When I decide on a color, I start to lay the tubes of paint around my palette to see where they will go.

Yellow

Starting with the color yellow, I took a look at all the tubes of paint I own.  I have a lot of tubes of paint!!!

New Watercolor Palette!

What a treat for me to get a new watercolor palette!  People often ask me what colors I use and how do I set up my palette.  I want to share with you the best way to set up a new watercolor palette.
This is the biggest palette that I have ever bought.  This is the Mijello Silber Nano Palette.

It has room for 40 colors!  Yippee!!!

Now the fun part is to decide which colors will go where.  I always use a color wheel to figure out where to put my colors.

The first thing to do is to pull out the tubes of color that I want to add to my new palette.  This will take some time and careful thought.

Jacqueline Newbold DVDs

Good Colorful Morning!  

Are you new to watercolor and not sure how to get started?  I have just the DVD for you!  It is Watercolor Toolbox One offered for sale through Artful Gathering Online Art Retreat.  

I take you step-by-step on everything you need to know about painting with watercolor.  Exploring techniques to get you started on your artistic journey, you will learn the correct way to set up a palette and care for your watercolor art supplies.  

You will also learn a variety of basic watercolor techniques.  All your examples can be put into a file or journal creating a toolbox for future reference.  This workshop on DVD is the perfect introduction to watercolor painting! 

Using Black Gesso

I wrote an article for Cloth, Paper, Scissors magazine a while back about creating a very interesting journal page using black gesso.  It is a favorite technique of mine and love the look of it in my journals!

Jeannine Stein blogged about it at the Cloth, Paper, Scissors blog.
Here is a little of what she had to say:
In the article “Black-and-White Journal Pages” in the same issue of Pages, Jacqueline Newbold has a fantastic technique for prepping art journal pages and turning them into paper art. Start by painting a watercolor border on all sides of the paper. The beauty of this technique is that even if you’re not that familiar with watercolor, you really can’t go wrong. I sprinkled table salt on some areas of the wet paint to get a textured effect. 

PAINTING in Italy 2018

I am very happy to announce that I am teaching again in Orvieto, Italy, September 16-22, 2018! Consider joining me on this wonderful journey.  Painting in Italy is offered through Adventure in Italy.  I have very fond memories of our painting workshop in 2014 creating colorful memories in our watercolor journals.  We had so much fun exploring Orvieto - what great food, wonderful wine tasting, friendly people and it was so inspiring to be surrounded by beautiful Italian art!
If you have taken a workshop with Adventures in Italy before, you will get a 10% discount for being a returning artist.

Let's paint together!

Here are a few photos of our joyous time together: