Night Glob Artisan Watercolor
Mar. 27th, 2020 01:26 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ellerWhat do you do when you're quarantined and can't indulge in your due round of therapeutic shopping spree? You buy new watercolors. Out of sheer boredom I decided to invest in some handmade artisan watercolors, which was a bad decision. THEY SUCK. Seriously, why do etsy sellers just mix some pigment with who-knows-what, fill it in pans and ship it as "artisan paint" to customers without ever testing their own product? (It's actually a charitable assumption on my part that they did not test it and ship it anyway...)
Soooo, this was the third time I received seriously bad handmade paint, and always from different sellers. I'm learning. Apparently, with artisan paints it's like in fairy tales: you can live happily in that castle UNLESS you unlock that door. Your marriage is happy UNLESS you give that seal skin back to your wife. Artisan paints are a good investment UNLESS you try to actually paint with them. (The only good handmade watercolors I ever had were those my friend sent me along with that bright yellow sketchbook. Tellingly, she doesn't sell those on etsy.)
I got extremely frustrated, and that's when I had the idea: I don't have to buy shitty paint, I can make my own shitty paint! And that's how Night Glob was created.
What I was going for is a transparent (!) blue-black that's not too saturated, and that most importantly doesn't overwhelm black lines when I paint over them. Basically, I wanted a "shadow color" for my sketchbook, one that works in monochromatic pictures. And because I'm, well, me, I added some sparkle to that, too.
Of course I cheated, because that's just my nature: I didn't just use pigment and that weird-tasting honey from the kitchen (the one that only tastes of sugar, not of honey; finally a good use for that product!) but also mixed some pre-existing watercolors in. My goal was not artisanal purity, I was aiming for watercolor paint that's actually usable. Just for fun, I'm presenting it in a way an etsy seller would do it.
Yeah, Night Glob is not a typo... Remember, this is shitty paint. The whole time, while making this stuff, I was thinking that if only I had some more Lawful Evil tendencies, I could give it a fancy name like "Night Glow" and sell it on Etsy. (Turns out I'm not quite evil enough for that...) Because I had no experience with watercolor binders and the handling of mica pigment, at some point the whole thing turned into, well, a glob of goo. At that point decided, okay, this stuff isn't "Night Glow", it's "Night Glob". I kept the name because I think it fits.
The first thing I tested my new paint on was this brush-pen drawing of a raven. I rarely draw animals so it's far from good art, but I'm very happy with the way I can get dark shadows with "Night Glob" but the ink lines underneath are still visible! This is exactly what I wanted, so in some weird way the experiment can actually be counted as a success.
Annnd of course I had to paint a botanical. Just because. I wanted to test if Night Glob works as a shadow color on white objects. (Shadows on white are tricky...) Yeah, I think I can work with this.
Soooo, this was the third time I received seriously bad handmade paint, and always from different sellers. I'm learning. Apparently, with artisan paints it's like in fairy tales: you can live happily in that castle UNLESS you unlock that door. Your marriage is happy UNLESS you give that seal skin back to your wife. Artisan paints are a good investment UNLESS you try to actually paint with them. (The only good handmade watercolors I ever had were those my friend sent me along with that bright yellow sketchbook. Tellingly, she doesn't sell those on etsy.)
I got extremely frustrated, and that's when I had the idea: I don't have to buy shitty paint, I can make my own shitty paint! And that's how Night Glob was created.
What I was going for is a transparent (!) blue-black that's not too saturated, and that most importantly doesn't overwhelm black lines when I paint over them. Basically, I wanted a "shadow color" for my sketchbook, one that works in monochromatic pictures. And because I'm, well, me, I added some sparkle to that, too.
Of course I cheated, because that's just my nature: I didn't just use pigment and that weird-tasting honey from the kitchen (the one that only tastes of sugar, not of honey; finally a good use for that product!) but also mixed some pre-existing watercolors in. My goal was not artisanal purity, I was aiming for watercolor paint that's actually usable. Just for fun, I'm presenting it in a way an etsy seller would do it.
Yeah, Night Glob is not a typo... Remember, this is shitty paint. The whole time, while making this stuff, I was thinking that if only I had some more Lawful Evil tendencies, I could give it a fancy name like "Night Glow" and sell it on Etsy. (Turns out I'm not quite evil enough for that...) Because I had no experience with watercolor binders and the handling of mica pigment, at some point the whole thing turned into, well, a glob of goo. At that point decided, okay, this stuff isn't "Night Glow", it's "Night Glob". I kept the name because I think it fits.
The first thing I tested my new paint on was this brush-pen drawing of a raven. I rarely draw animals so it's far from good art, but I'm very happy with the way I can get dark shadows with "Night Glob" but the ink lines underneath are still visible! This is exactly what I wanted, so in some weird way the experiment can actually be counted as a success.
Annnd of course I had to paint a botanical. Just because. I wanted to test if Night Glob works as a shadow color on white objects. (Shadows on white are tricky...) Yeah, I think I can work with this.
