Monday 11 May 2015

Golden Acrylic Paints

From L-R, Ultramarine, Violet, Magenta, Crimson, Azo Gold, Cad Yellow Med
I have mostly painted with watercolours or oils and used to get very frustrated with acrylics.  When I decided to work in mixed media at the end of last year, I had to come to terms with needing to use acrylic paint.  As a compromise, I decided to order in some Golden Opens.  I love them!

I decided to do some paint swatches to get a feel for the colours.  They are all quite transparent, some more so than others, particularly the ultramarines.  This becomes more evident in the second row, where I have added some Open medium and water to thin them.

On the third row, I increased their opacity by adding white, while that works, it does lessen the intensity of the colours.

On the fourth row, I added some ultramarine blue to each colour, which results in some lovely purples and greens.

Finally, I thought I would add some yellow to the original colours, which has resulted in a warm palette of oranges and greens.

I intend to get some more colours when I next place an order with the supplier.  I can see I would benefit from a cooler blue, a cerulean would be good and maybe a cooler yellow.

It is fun and useful, to do swatches when you get new paints, it helps to familiarise yourself with them.

12 comments:

Jennifer Rose said...

If I didn't already have a giant tub full of unopened paint I would get a few of these to try since they sound like they would be nice to use :)

Chris Lally said...

Acrylics have always scared me, but I have some tubes and will try the swatches. Good advice, Rolina. Thanks!

stapeliad said...

I have a bunch of Opens. I also have a comparison of the Open ultramarine to Lukas 1862. I should do a blog post on that.

I should also do some Open color charts.

When I was getting my Opens, I discovered that it really is much, much better to get single pigment colors. they have a lot of 2-3-4 pigment mixes and they do not really mix very nicely.

stapeliad said...

Um...wow. They have an ultramarine violet. I did not realize that. I have their diox. violet but I need me some ultramarine v in acrylic too....

Rolina said...

Jessica, I would love to see the blog post on the Ultramarines, please!

Yes, I do try to get single pigment mixes where possible. I love crimson, but the alizarin hue has 3 pigments so the Quinacridone Crimson was a better choice at just 2. I hope it plays well with the others. Maybe I should have bought cad orange instead of the Quinacridone/Nickel Azo Gold which has two pigments. Oh dear, I feel another order coming on, LOL!

Rolina said...

Jennifer, one can't have too much paint!

Rolina said...

Chris, don't be afraid, they take a bit of adjusting, but are very versatile.

stapeliad said...

Ok Rols I will do an acrylic post. Get the cobalt blue and cerulean for your blues along with the ultramarine. The pthalo blue is good too. They are all the single pigments and you won't notice the price if you are accustomed to oils! :D

AprilRimpo said...

I like to do testing with my pigments too, but not quite so orderly as yours. Laughing at myself since it can be a challenge when I go back to them.

I have wondered what was special about their OPEN line versus their other pigments. I've been using Golden's fluid acrylic but would like to mix in some little bit heavier tubes too. Good to hear the OPENs are transparent.

Thanks for the insights

kaslkaos said...

Oh boy, I was thinking of cracking open my acrylics and trying them on paper for the first time ever, and now I see this. Yay, thanks.

Rolina said...

April, the Opens seem to be weaker in pigment than the originals, but that is OK, I just use more!

Ingrid, it is a good way to break the ice and before you know it, you will have a painting completed!

Linda said...

I am not artistic at all, but I love to look at paintings and work of those who are! Claude Monet is one of my favourite artists but I like the works of many artists as you can tell by my blog posts. :) I like acrylic and oil the best, but some watercolours are very nice, too.