Color Study

M. GRAHAM & CO. - CADMIUM RED

• Starting this color study with one of the more expensive watercolors I bought. Not crazy expensive but I bought it from ben franklin which can get pretty pricey.
• I like how thick the paint is, its not watery thin. It blends out really nicely and evenly.

ART CREATION - SCARLET

• This is the first color from a cheaper pallet I bought from ace hardware.
• It's okay, its not my favorite formula (I don't have much reference since I just started watercolor painting).
• It does blend out pretty soft which I like, but it comes out of the tube pretty watery.

ART CREATION - ALIZARIN CRIMSON

• This one didn't blend out like I wanted. 
• I don't really like it that much. I do like how dark the color is but I don't think I like this formula for paint.

ART CREATIONS - BURNT SIENNA

• This is the color/paint I used for the first Sailor Jerry book to get the skin tone to match on the pin ups.
• It blends out pretty good.
• The thing I found with these colors is they harden in my pallet and when I try to reactivate it I have a hard time getting it to the darkness that I need.

ART CREATION - YELLOW OCHRE

• So this whole paint set I bought is weird, some of the colors blend out nicely and some don't, but they should all be the same formula.
• I don't love this color, it was hard to blend out evenly.
• This whole paint set is a hit or miss for me. 

ART CREATION - YELLOW

• This one blends better than the yellow ochre in my opinion.

DANIEL SMITH - CADMIUM YELLOW

• This is another brand that I bought from ben franklin.
• It does blend okay but it's really hard to get that nice soft yellow that the art creation yellow can get.
• But for spots where I need a nice rich gold color this paint takes the cake.
• Also a little more on the expensive side.

ART CREATION - YELLOWISH GREEN

• I love this green.
• It is a little iffy blending wise but its just such a pretty color.

ART CREATION - DEEP GREEN

• Again some blending issues which is weird when its with a brand where some colors blend good and others don't.
• The color itself comes out really pretty and leaves a lot more dark rather than jumping straight into lighter shades (if that makes any sense).

DANIEL SMITH - HOOKER'S GREEN

• I do like this paint for how rich and dark the color can be but boy is it a pain to blend out.
• Just seems to get kind of streaky.

ART CREATION - CERULEAN BLUE

• This is really the main reason I bought the art creation paints, I realized in the first Sailor Jerry book that I needed some blue (for very small bits but still).
• The top left I still had some green on my brush from the greens prior so the color came out this nice ocean blue green which I like.
• But it doesn't blend like I want it to, bummer.
• Also I tried to make some purple by blending this blue with the M. Graham & Co. - Cadmium Red and it came out more like a brownish maroon color.

ART CREATION - ULTRAMARINE

• This might be my favorite color.
• It blends out really nicely and comes to this soft baby blue.
• Also I mixed this color with the Art Creation - Alizarin Crimson and successfully made purple, a darker purple but still purple.

ART CREATION - PAYNE'S GREY

• I don't like this color. Just doesn't blend good.
• Also why call it grey if it's actually black... because you can get grey from black...

M. GRAHAM & CO. - LAMP BLACK

• Hands down my favorite of all the paints/colors I have.
• I used this black for a lot of my shading throughout the first Sailor Jerry book (I was struggling with india inks).
• Blends so nicely and stays really black where I need it to be.

RESULTS:

Overall, the M. Graham & Co. paints are my favorite out of all the ones I have. They blend out very nicely and its a smooth formula. The Daniel Smith brand isn't terrible it's pretty nice as well but I do have some issues with blending. And the Art Creation brand is a 50/50 shot. Some colors are awesome and some aren't. But I enjoyed this project, helped me understand how to use watercolors since it's still kind of foreign to me.