Palette of colors and color mixtures used in Strelitzia watercolor.
This is the paper I used to mix colors for the Strelitzia illustration before applying paint to the picture itself.
I hadn’t been using ultramarine lately, but it really worked for the bright clean blues found in the flower. Using it again in the stalk not only matched the plant itself, but unified the composition. I am not sure if the red was cadmium red light, or vermilion—normally I find the cadmium reds to go brown in mixtures, but this one stayed true, so perhaps was actually vermilion.
I found myself stretching my color muscles a little bit on this small painting, using mixtures I hadn’t used in a while. It’s good to get out of a rut of unawareness!
