SusieG Studio

The good thing about using a small palette is I get to work with a limited number of colors at one time. From this limited palette, I can experiment and create colorful mixes of additional colors to use.

For the last few months I’ve been using the same paint colors. I painted a swatch card as a reminder of what’s currently in my palette. After I created my first painting, the colors became very familiar to me and I relied less on the card.

Tip #1: I cut up old watercolor paper to use for my swatch cards. My latest swatch card measures around 3″ x 4-1/2″. I’ve also used watercolor post cards and cut them in half. I painted the rows of colors on my card and used my Uni Pin or Micron fine line pen to write the names of the paint color.

The colors worked well for my floral sketches, but I sensed that I was going to move forward into a different direction and challenge myself again in my watercolor creativity.

I was looking at other artists’ sketches and paintings and started to notice a trend in the colors they were using for their Urban Sketching and landscape paintings. I purchased additional tubes of Daniel Smith Watercolors that were recommended and decided to give them a try especially for mixing other vibrant colors.

I first checked my paint bin and noticed I already had tubes of Yellow Ochre and Hooker’s Green in my stash. I added Manganese Blue and Indian Yellow to my collection.

I filled my empty pans with the new colors and swapped out the colors I no longer needed for my palette.

Here’s a picture of the two swatch cards together. The top card is the previous colors I’ve used. The bottom card is the current colors in my palette.

Tip #2: I wanted to share that I’ve re-used my wooden fountain pen rest from Galen Leather to also hold my paint brushes and to keep them from rolling off my studio desk. This pen/brush rest is small enough to throw in my travel bag or my watercolor tote bin.

I’m currently working on a few small sketches in my Luchetti sketchbook. I’m calling this my “transition page” where I’m transitioning from the previous colors to using the new colors I’ve added.

Summary: I’m just “going with my flow” on this page in my sketchbook. Not putting any pressure on myself to create the perfect paintings. Just enjoying my creative moments and playing around with my color mixes and see what happens.

Tip #3: I’ve created a ring of single swatch cards representing each tube of Daniel Smith watercolor paints I have in my stash. I got the idea from my fountain pen and ink hobby where I used the Col-o-ring cards to create my swatches for my fountain pen inks. I thought it would be a great idea to create a set for my watercolor paints using watercolor paper.

On each card I’ve included the name of the color, pigment number(s), transparency, granulation, series, light fastness, and staining information.

Here’s my Primatek color swatch cards. There’s no pigment number for the colors as they are genuine minerals/gemstones.

The single swatch cards come in handy when I’m working in my studio and trying to match a color from one of my photographs. The cards also make it easy to see if I already have a color in my stash. This helps to avoid purchasing duplicate colors.

My cards were a DIY project and I created a post back in 2022 on how to create the cards. You can find my blog post here.

Besides my Daniel Smith cards, I also have a set for my Sennelier and for my Schmincke watercolor paints.

Pen: Uni PinFine Line in 01 size with Light Grey ink

Paint: Daniel Smith Extra Fine Watercolors

Brushes: Rosemary & Co R26-Red Dot Pointed Round #4 and R13-Sable Blend Pointed #8. The brushes can be found at Art Toolkit at this link.

Journal: Luchetti True Flat Sketchbook. Mixed Media. 100% cotton. Cold Press. 8″x8″ with 22 sheets/44 pages. 600gsm (300lb). Archival. Acid-Free. Gelatin-free vegan sizing. Vegan PU leather covers. The sketchbook can be found at this link.

Palette: Winsor & Newton. There is an empty palette with an included small travel brush available on Amazon.