Home › Forums › The Learning Center › Color Theory and Mixing › what’s your favorite blue pigment? :D
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April 4, 2016 at 6:46 pm #993976
here’s a fun little discussion! 。◕‿◕。
blue in general is a really nice color that a lot of people like. and what’s cool about it is that there are SO MANY DIFFERENT PIGMENTS FOR IT.
so im wondering, what is your favorite single blue paint pigment that you like to use/ most commonly use and why??
ill make a happy little poll with someone the common single pigments but feel free to share anything
April 4, 2016 at 7:21 pm #1249763I voted for phthalo blue, the one that I cannot do without. In other words, if I had push to pick ONE blue only, I would choose PB15.
For blue I always used Lefranc or Blockx, due to poppy oil as a binder (I’m afraid the yellowing about blue, violet and white), but recently I’m enjoying Old Holland Sheveningen blue deep, a wonderful color ground in linseed oil; I think that with a single 40ml. tube I’ll paint a few hundred paintings!Mimmo Ceccarelli - Painter
https://www.facebook.com/ceccarellimimmo/April 4, 2016 at 7:48 pm #1249745I voted for Ultramarine Blue (which has more tendencies toward the primary color, Cyan, than toward actual Blue). While not being a true primary, I find Ultramarine Blue to be one of the most useful “Blues”.
It mixes with White to create skies. It works with Dioxazine Purple to create cast shadows. It mixes with an entire array of “Yellows” to create many different Greens. It mixes with a couple of different Umbers to create neutral, or nearly-neutral colors.
I appreciate the primary color, Cyan, (Thalo Blue), as well, but as far as a practical color to have on my palette, I am finding Ultramarine Blue to be a very useful, practical color.
I teach a class in oil painting at a local recreation center, and for years, I’ve been “carving” my palette colors down, so as to make their purchase more equitable for my students from a $$ standpoint. I’ve discovered that nearly ANY landscape, or still-life can be created using only the following colors (two of which are White and Black).
Ivory Black
Ultramarine Blue
Burnt Umber
Cadmium Red
Cadmium Yellow Light
Titanium WhiteHowever, I must admit that (as monet63 mentions) if I were stranded on a desert island, and was allowed to have only 4 paints with which to create all the possible colors that appeared to me in the landscape, I would select the primary colors, Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, and White.
In paint, that would be Cyan: Thalo Blue (PB15). Magenta: Permanent Rose 502, or Thalo Red Rose (each of which are PV19). Yellow: W & N Transparent Yellow 653 (PY128).
The primary colors simply cannot be beat for being capable of creating the greatest gamut of colors possible. My limited palette of only 6 colors won’t cut it for creating ALL possible colors. For example mine is very deficient in the color, Purple, or Violet. One cannot create “Violet” or “Purple” with the palette of colors I recommended. Red and Blue do not create a clean “Purple”. MAGENTA and Blue do!
wfmartin. My Blog "Creative Realism"...
https://williamfmartin.blogspot.comApril 4, 2016 at 9:03 pm #1249770It’s different whether it’s oil or watercolor.
In oil paint it’s easier to casually mix colors and fine tune the mixes with controlled adjustments. I typically just use ultramarine in oil paint even though I have plenty of other options. It’s inexpensive and gets the job done well. It may not be ideal for mixing greens, but then it’s easy enough to add a green to the palette and use that as a base for green mixes.
In watercolor it’s different because it’s harder to be exact with mixes and you have to consider granulation as an aspect of the paint. I have a preference for cerulean because depending on the variety it’s a great sky color and fairly light in masstone, so it can be applied more liberally without accidentally going too dark. Indigo, especially PB66 (the synthetic version of natural indigo), is another blue that I use a lot in watercolor and is good with a low chroma palette of yellow and red ochres or a burnt umber, which is just the kind of palette I prefer. Then again, ultramarine is an inexpensive workhorse without the concerns of cobalt in the waste water during disposal and is more widely useful than indigo. Plus, adding a little green earth, which is weak tinting, into ultramarine and diluting it well gets a very similar color and granulation to cerulean while being much more transparent. I almost want to say cerulean for the color straight from the tube, or indigo because I use it so much, but if by favorite you mean a blue I’d want as my only option then I’d probably have to go with ultramarine.
When I was taking art classes a long time ago I remember switching from ultramarine to Prussian blue because it seemed different and exotic, and then later to indanthrone blue for the same reason. Eventually I tried pretty much every blue pigment made. Somehow I seem to have come back around to choosing ultramarine.
April 5, 2016 at 9:59 am #1249778This is confusing because ultramarine comes in different hues.
In the Winsor & Newton line there are two ultramarine blues, one called “French” and one called “Green Shade.”
I’ve been using the “Green Shade” a lot recently. It is almost the same hue as cobalt blue so it’s a poor man’s cobalt. It’s also a very weak paint, and comes out of the tube very oily. Easy for making sky blue, just mix with white.
April 5, 2016 at 11:31 am #1249741If I had to choose just one blue that I had to live/work with the rest of my life…possibly Ultramarine Blue. But since the question is which is your favorite, it’s probably Indanthrone / Indanthrene / Anthraquinone Blue PB60 for its combination of novelty and its usefulness.
It’s moderately chromatic, so it doesn’t need to be constantly dulled down – so it’s natural and easy to use (especially in tonalism), with a huge value range. Yet applied thickly undiluted or untinted, it’s an incredibly deep & rich blue…deeper than Ultramarine.
April 5, 2016 at 12:48 pm #1249760When I described fillers for painting purpose, I found that PB15:3 is better than anything I tried before. I vote Phthalo blue. The second love is Prussian Blue for darks.
April 6, 2016 at 1:36 am #1249780cerulean
so nice straight from the jarApril 6, 2016 at 3:14 pm #1249752AnonymousCobalt is my favorite. It is a pretty, soft, true blue, most others are violet or greenish.
April 7, 2016 at 6:17 am #1249769AnonymousGolden Paints Anthraquinone Blue without a doubt. It is such a beautiful, velvety deep blue with the widest range of gorgeous tones. I love it
April 7, 2016 at 10:44 am #1249774Tough choice between ultramarine and Prussian blue. I probably use more ultramarine for mixing colours, but I simply love the blue colour of the Prussian, both very dark, straight from the tube, and thinned. So my winner is Prussian blue.
April 7, 2016 at 11:07 am #1249757Cobalt blue. Semi-opaque, pretty but not too chromatic, and unassuming in mixtures with earth colors. Makes wonderful dull cyans mixed with terre verte or cobalt green. Smashing for portraiture.
My website: http://www.rusticportraits.com
My artwork blog: http://llawrencebispo.wordpress.com
My art materials blog: http://sunsikell.wordpress.comApril 8, 2016 at 7:05 am #1249772Ugh,
I guess I’m spoiled from always using warm & cool primaries so this is a tough call. For me it means sacrificing a seconday: in this case purple or green. I’m thinking Golden’s Phthalo Blue GS (PB 15:4) is the best compromise. As mid-range as it is, my precious purples are still gonna suffer a bit. Sigh:(-wendy
Swatch from Golden’s website
[FONT=Palatino Linotype]"I like kids' work more than work by real artists any day."
-Jean-Michel Basquiat [FONT=Palatino Linotype]
Boy and Dog in a JohnnypumpApril 8, 2016 at 2:44 pm #1249782I voted for Ultramarine Blue (which has more tendencies toward the primary color, Cyan, than toward actual Blue). While not being a true primary, I find Ultramarine Blue to be one of the most useful “Blues”.
…
In paint, that (CMY primaries) would be Cyan: Thalo Blue (PB15). Magenta: Permanent Rose 502, or Thalo Red Rose (each of which are PV19). Yellow: W & N Transparent Yellow 653 (PY128).
…I’ve seen your paintings here, so I know what you mean. I’m still doing many color mixing exercises. Lately, I’ve been thinking that if I had to toss a color, it would be ultramarine blue. But it doesn’t seem to lean green.
As you noted, UB does well making neutrals with some earths, and makes some nice greens with yellow. But I don’t like UB’s own color, especially when lightened. However hard it is to use Phthalo Blue GS (PB15:3 or PB15:4, rather than PB15:1), I find that with careful usage, I get colors I like better. Its green mixtures are easily controlled with Quinacridone Violet (PV19) which I prefer to the red or rose shades, since I don’t need a lot of highly chromatic reds or oranges, or purples.
Instead of mixing neutrals across an UB-Sienna/Umber axis, I’m trying Phthalo Blue GS against Venetian Red these days.
April 8, 2016 at 3:28 pm #1249792Prussian Blue for me, I use Ultramarine Blue and others sometimes as well but there’s almost always Prussian Blue somewhere in each of my paintings.
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