Tuesday, March 27, 2012

Saving oil paint

I borrowed the idea of a 'holding' palette for unused paint at the end of a painting session.  I started by putting my glass palette in a box, then a plastic bag stored in the freezer.  Worked okay, but I found I really enjoyed starting with a clean palette. So I started storing leftover paint on a white salad size plate, put it in a sealed plastic plate holder in the freezer. But the plate is hard to clean, so I went the ultra easy/lazy route, and save any usable paints on a piece of disposable palette paper, plop that into the bottom of a standard Ziploc sandwich container, pop the lid on, and throw it in the freezer. No clean up when the paint is used up, colors not being used can go right back into the freezer so the faster drying organics don't dry out, and it doesn't take up as much room in the freezer.

Postscript 4/3/14:  Nothing stays the same here, so I ended up using a rectangular plain white tile (3x6") to store leftover paint.  I made a little box with a fold over lid out of plain old cardboard, put that in a ziploc bag and it holds well for up to a couple of weeks.  The organics will dry out no matter what, so I only save the mixes I might need again and the colors I know won't dry out. 

Thursday, March 8, 2012

Pandora




SOLD
10 x 10 Oil on archival canvas panel

I finally managed to get a painting done in the same week the DPW Challenge was posted!  Who doesn't love to paint a horsey! And as usual, I learned something new. In this case, check the finished painting next to the challenge/reference photo.  (This is an easy thing to do with a computer, but you have to remember to do it!)  I had no idea I wasn't using the right value for the horse until I saw it posted with the others.  Very valuable exercise these challenges!  Thank you to David and Carol Marine for providing such a valuable and helpful website.