My First Professional Palette

I've played around for the last 6 months or so with student quality or dollar store paints, and after seeing the more professional people successfully lay down beautiful colors that flow and gently blend into each other, I've taken the time to put a palette together. The first picture I did a few days ago with the pro paints was satisfying -- those colors just happily mixed and there was less "bloom" with the pro colors!

So originally I bought a $14 set of cheapie AQUAnaut paints off Amazon. Thought I would pop the colors out and use them like chalk for something ... but then decided that it was too much effort. I really liked the paintbox -- it efficiently holds and organizes 24 colors on one side of a box, it's metal so won't stain, and best of all, it's compact with no detachable parts and can be clipped to a palette board for a simplistic plein air style of painting! Went to Hangaram, one of the biggest local art stores here in Seoul, and found the very same paintbox. Yep, bought it.

And since I was setting up my professional "large" paintbox, I also put together yet another Altoid box of paints, this one professional. Paints used were an eclectic mix of M. Graham and SWC (ShinHan Water Color Professional).

The $14 AQUAnaut set on the left (I decorated the back of the color swatches) and the M. Graham and SWC medley of transparent watercolors on the right. I have to say, Steve at The Mind of Watercolor has really influenced my choice of paints. He uses M. Graham, which isn't a controlling factor for me, but he also chooses to paint with principally transparent watercolors because they're excellent for glazing. Now this last point is something that resonates with me!

And since I live in S. Korea and SK has recently come out with a professional brand of watercolors, which are principally transparent, easily accessible to me, gorgeous in color, and very reasonably priced, I selected 13 colors from SWC, and then after considering transparency, colors and price, chose M. Graham as the other brand to complete my palette of only transparent colors. They compliment each other beautifully! I'm so ready to paint!

Left - $14 AQUAnaut set for experimenting with; Middle - my new Altoid box of professional paints; Right - my M. Graham and SWC professional paint box. 

Colors all labeled to name brand, color, pigment, transparency (only two are semi-transparent: M.G. sepia and M.G. Payne's grey), lightfastness (I only bought the two highest lightfast ratings for both brands), and whether they are staining or granulating.

After setting up my paintbox, I put a little watercolor art on the back of the paint box color swatch sheet.

Professional paints in a box for on-the-go painting.

My all-new professional paintbox: studio and plein air sizes.