Patricia – thanks. Love the feedback, and would love to meet you.

Here’s the painting after some finishing touches:

I did another blog post with a before and after detailing some of the change I made. You can check it out here:

http://timonsloane.blogspot.com/2013/01/seascape-can-you-spot-finishing-touches.html

Thanks Gary – glad you found it helpful.

Patrice – your question is timely because I have recently shifted my palette and my supply list on my website is a bit out of date.

I just warmed my palette recently, which has me using these primaries:
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[*]ultramarine blue (deep if I have it)
[*]Perrole red (cobra) or rembrandt permanent red
[*]perm yellow medum (cobra) or any cad yellow medium

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With these additionals:
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[*]white (I’m starting to move away from titanium to zink and/or lead)
[*]trans. red oxide

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You might find it interesting – I stopped using lemon yellow (for my old colors, see):

[INDENT] http://www.timonsloane.com/supply-list-oil-workshops[/INDENT]

The fascinating thing is that most people can’t tell the difference in my finished paintings when I move my palette around. They often can’t even tell the difference between my pastel and oil paintings. The palette/medium is always interesting, but it’s just a tool. I always think it’s more important to know what you’re trying to build, and not let your tools dictate what you build (so to speak).

I highly recommend a limited palette for everyone except very advance painters. I own a million colors that I bought/used/tried when I was starting out. They didn’t solve any of my problems Miles of painting and a resulting good understanding of color theory have done much more than any box full of special tube of paint ever did for me.

SSB – For me it’s any subject any medium. On any given day I tend to be called by the medium (I might just feel like squeezing out oils that day). Or it’s whatever is loaded in my van when I get the urge to head out to paint. Or maybe what will pack the lighter load if I’m going to do a big hike to a painting location.

I guess I don’t believe that there are certain subjects that require a specific medium.

I love both pastels and oils, and I think my work gets stronger when I work across both mediums. As an example – I learned a lot about what is possible with color when working exclusively with pastel for a couple of years. I could just find and try a huge range of colors to solve some difficult problems in a painting. It’s really not just about matching colors to the scene when painting, it’s knowing exactly will work in certain situations. With that accumulated knowledge, I think I now can more rapidly visualize what color/value/saturation I want and I know what I want to mix when working in oil.

Kathleen – I started with a color wheels in the studio when selecting my palette originally. This can help you identify any ‘holes’ you have (colors that are difficult to mix or approximate).

To a large degree I think I can’t really go wrong with any limited palette.

Kathleen – that post by James Gurney is really good. He has a great blog, and a terrific book on ‘light and color’.

I learned from him the theory of ‘limited gamut’, which boils down to the fact that any 3 primaries can be used to make a painting work (and when I say any 3, it can be as extreme as using a green or grey instead of yellow for instance). Really interesting stuff, and it is relevant here because it means any limited palette can be made to work. I was specifically thinking of this limited gamut theory when I made the claim above that you can’t go wrong with any limited palette.

Here’s a pointer to the first of his posts on the topic:
http://gurneyjourney.blogspot.com/2008/01/color-wheel-masking-part-1.html

Kind of advance stuff, but really interesting topic if you’re into that kind of thing.

Timon