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Making watercolor

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moredhel:
Hello I wanted to share my experiences with making watercolor.

I have a premade set for making watercolor which I would recommend if someone wants to start with it. Because there were recipes in it. And I totally needed these for the start.


This is what I use for making the paint (here venetian red). The lower part of the pestle and the inner of the mortar are not glazed. This is helpful for the dispersion of the pigment.

For making the color you need pigment and a solution of the binder. This can be bought ready made. (was included in the set) and it is possible to make it yourself. The classical binder for watercolor is gum arabic. In asia similar colors are traditionally made using glue as a binder but I never tried this. When I make it myself I dissole gum arabic in the double ammount of water. If there is dirt in it I filtrate it. Than I add a little bit of glycerine. Some people add honey or ox bile to inprove the solubility and the dispersion of the color on the paper but I never tried this.
Leftover solution can be stored in the fridge. If uncooled it can get moldy.

The making of the color is simply putting pigment in the mortar and then rubbing the binder solution in until there is an homogenous liquid with the right consistency. It is hard to describe it is ver mud like. I just made venetian red according to the recipe until I could feel the right consistency.
When the right consistency is met I fill the color in a pan and let it dry. It dries faster if filled in in thin layers and the next layer is added after it has dried. but even then it does take long until it is dried normaly it takes days until a pan is completely filled.
If you do not want to wait until it has dried you could buy empty aluminium tubes and fill the color in there. I think I am too clumsy for this.
Normally I test a new color I never made before I test it before I let it dry. The color is ready to use directly out of the mortar.
If you got the ammounts wrong two things can happen if there is not enough binder solution the color dries to a massive block of color and you can not dissolve any of it with water. If there is too much of the solution the color will not dry in the pan and just stay liquid. It is still usable just hard to handle without this empty little tubes.

I would recommend everybody who uses watercolor to try this. Because it is really fun. And you get colors without fillers just pigment and binder. And you can colors that xou can not buy at all. E. g. I am not limited to the particle size one would normally use. As you can see here

I made a color with bigger particles where I glue small but visible garnets to the paper with the binder. It has a nice sparkling effect and could be a way for lazy people to paint distant pebbles.

The first not buyable color I made and used was gofun shirayuki. A japanese pigment made from rotten oyster shells. And I think it is a great color for ghosts and fog if diluted. Less diluted it could be useful to paint porcelain (but I did not test this). I used it in this picture.


If anybody has any different experiences feel free to correct me. If there are any questions please ask.

P. S. in my learning process I made a lot of venetian red I could give away some if someone needs a pan.

tehta:
So, as you know, I am very interested in this... and have many questions.

What is the set you would recommend?
How long does the grinding take? (Presumably it depends on the pigment, but, like, order of magnitude?)
Without ox gall, are your colours very non-dispersive?
What other colours have you made? (What was the color you used for the background in the Yuletide flower-branches painting? Was it Venetian Red?)

moredhel:

--- Quote from: tehta on January 06, 2022, 04:51:56 PM ---So, as you know, I am very interested in this... and have many questions.

What is the set you would recommend?

--- End quote ---
The set I used was this https://www.kremer-pigmente.com/en/shop/new-products/14304-paint-making-set-watercolor-artist-product-2020.html worked fine for me.

--- Quote from: tehta on January 06, 2022, 04:51:56 PM ---How long does the grinding take? (Presumably it depends on the pigment, but, like, order of magnitude?)

--- End quote ---
I would say it takes about 10 minutes. But it is a simple slow repetitive procedure my thougts drift away a lot during the process so i can not tell for sure.

--- Quote from: tehta on January 06, 2022, 04:51:56 PM ---Without ox gall, are your colours very non-dispersive?

--- End quote ---
No they are not. Some of the ready made pans you can buy come with lists of ingredients. So I know some of the commerial brands use it and some don't.

--- Quote from: tehta on January 06, 2022, 04:51:56 PM ---What other colours have you made? (What was the color you used for the background in the Yuletide flower-branches painting? Was it Venetian Red?)

--- End quote ---
Apart from the colors already mentioned I made colors from the other pigments in the set (yellow ochre and kobalt blue) I made malachite green because I was running out of it. I made some different tones of ochre (obviously very similar in handling) and ivory black just to test if I can do it. Next I want to try to make ultramarine blue color and maybe some more intense yellow tones but still have to decide which.
If I had a mill to make the stones to fine powder myself I would try to make realgar color which I am not allowed to buy because it is toxic. But I have realgar crystals bought from a mineral shop.

The background color in the flower branches painting was a mixture of venetian red and yellow ochre.

Róisín:
I presume the blues and greens are mostly copper compounds? Have you used lapis? Or any of the animal or vegetable colouring substances? Eggwhite or powdered eggshells as a base? How different is the process to making inks?

moredhel:
The blues and greens I made myself are malachite and ultramarine. And the kobalt blue included in the set. I use synthetic ultramarine because of the price. I do have some color made of lapis but I bought it ready made because it is to expensive to mess around with it. There are some beutiful copper based blues but as my family shows a complete reluctance to recycle my paintings I do not use them because over time the oxydize to malachite. In watercolor this hapens relatively fast.
In the field of animal and vegetable colors I so far only fell for the forbidden beauty of carmine. But I did not make the color myself. There are some plant and annimal pigments I want to test in the future like indigo, dragon's blood and sepia. And if I should get really rich somehow purpurissum.
Eggwhite as a base sonds like something that has to be used really quickly. I knew powdered eggshells only as a white pigment.
I have seen some recipes for making ink even for the traditional one with oak apples. But it seems to be a long and relatively complex process.

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