Once it's mixed (assuming you don't use up all the paint in one day) can't you put the palette in the freezer so you're not laying it out each day?

If I mix the palette on Saturday I can use it Sunday and sometimes Monday, by putting the box with paints in water. But I have never tried freezing the paint. How long would that last? Often I can't get a whole day to paint until Monday and then it would be five more days before I am back at it. Would the paint last five days?? Of course, Marvin, would say, "mix the palette each time you paint, to improve your color mixing abilities"!

I can save paint in the freezer for at least a week.

I paint almost every day and squeeze out new paint as I use it up so it's hard to tell how long it lasts, exactly. However, the colors I don't use up very quickly last a long, long time. Paints that dry quickly in the open air also dry more quickly in the freezer (like umbers). Slow drying paints (like Gamblin's Alizarin Permanent) last longer since they dry more slowly in the open air too.

Two hours a day to mix up a full palette of colors sounds like a huge amount of time -- and an awful lot of money scraped off at the end of each day.

You can greatly improve your color mixing abilities by using that two hours each day to actually paint!

Mixing the paint is a very good training, but I would not spend two whole hours every day on it.

I believe that Marvin said, in his post about his palette, that he have tubed all his values of Neutral Gray, Yellow Ocher, Venetian Red and Indian Red.. to save that time for painting in stead.

I have bought some 40 ML tubes and am going to mix and tube three of the values of each color, value 3, 5 and 7 on the 9 value scale. That will save a lot of time and I can easily mix the rest of the values, from these, when I need to.

I think that having them in tubes will be more economic since you can squeeze a bit out at a time.

I do not add drying medium to the mixtures before I have to use the colors. Then I take a bit of the paint with the knife and place it a little aside the place and mix dryer into it.

Allan

Allan,
Does is take any other special "tools" to tube the paint? How do you pinch the bottom? I am definately considering doing the same. Where to you get the tubes, someplace I can order online? Or would I have to come to Denmark - not a bad idea after all!! :D

Patricia,
If you come to

Allan,
Your english is fine, I could picture the process exactly as you described! I will have to surf around the web and see what I can find as it will take me longer to save us the money to shop in your neighborhood, though it sounds wonderful!! I sure would love to see some of your paintings in person!!