Dear Mitra community,
this week some friend send a link on Youtube talkes about best painting pracetice, host by Natrual Pigment. My understanding the point is paininting straight from tube (paste) thinnly in each layer and no need to worry about fat over lean rule. I truely appreciate their will to help artist iron out this confusing fat over lean concept for best painting practice, however i still see gaps it not covered and hope to discuss with the Mitra community.
1, it is not that practicle to paint all layer straight from tube, especially initial layer, like toning surface, blocking in, which requires fluidty, with butter like paste it would take forever to tone a surface. so it had to be solvent diluted for these layers. And it is correct adding solvent increased PVC, thus weaker film, however it creates a more porous film that readily accepting following layer and the oil from top will consolidate it as well, so even like water color consistency i not really see any issue as long as oils add back from following layer.
and since ealier layer always lacks of oil (higher PVC), it becomes critical to add oils to the paint on following layer proportionally, so this makes paint straight from tube without medium not practically possible as well.
2, besides discussed above, it also lacks consideration of fat vs slow dry color, even you paint all layer straight from tube thinnly but you paint a fast dry color over a slower one, i think it is probmatic as well. the best practice is to paint slower one on top of fast one always.
3, especially there are many outlier color that is both fat (low PVC) but dries fast, so if you ignore this rule, you may likely to overlay a fast dry phathlo blue on top of a slower dry color say pyrole red. Or you may paint a very fast drying and low oil content paint like Venetian red on top layer as fresh tone.
in conclusion, my point is PVC view is a basic concept of how pigment absorbs oil, however by its alone it cannot cover fat over lean concept well, as it both about oil content as well as drying speed, especially when we considered many outlier pigments.
i do agree due to market driven, most paint manufacture designed more for enthusestic hobbiest in mind who does care fat over lean with lean over fat so what mindset, but for serious artist, i do urge manufacture help artist to understand oil content, drying speed concept to avoid any confusion.
i hope it may help open discussion about something like:
what you do if you need a fast dry & average to high oil content oil color over top of average to slow dry oil & lower oil concent paint?
i am interest in this topic, any expert may help to input?
i also looked that youtube section and believe the host is George, maybe he can chat in here to explain out any confusion when people not agree with what said?
Yeah, i hope George can comment here as well. My question would be most time we are painting with color that dries faster on top of color that dries average to slow speed.
for instance, like in underpainting if you use titanium white, which is an average to slow dry color, then probabaly will mix some earth colors which dries very fast on top, then wont you really see a problem if you paint straight from tube in this way? so i want to ask you guys what you will do in this case?
Maybe:
1, you purchase similar colors in fast, medium and slow dry color catagory and place them in order?
Or, 2, you add oil to faster dry color to make it dries slower if you want to place it over average-slow dry color?
Or, 3, you completely not care drying speed and use whatever color needed in any order?
hope to get some insights in the community. thanks.
