My test swatch looks darker and more even than watercolor.It’s dark and quite matte, but not as flat and even as inks and gouache paint.It applies very easily, and if you put on a thick layer, the marks should not be visible once you go over it with a wet brush.I used a black water-soluble pastel to draw the silhouette of this surreal portrait Castles Water-soluble pastel I didn’t compare tube acrylic paint since it’s harder to brush on without texture, and it contains the same pigment so there’s no reason why it would appear any darker.I went over on one half of the swatch with another layer and it did nothing.It’s just barely lighter than gouache and has the same amount of subtle warm sheen.It’s still a very dark black, very even.I mixed in a drop of water to try to avoid that plastic acrylic shine.I prefer this method if I want a blue-black like the night sky, or a slightly sepia toned dark. Another issue with this method is achieving a perfectly neutral black.You do need more than 2 layers to get a deep, dark black.The first test that flopped, I used pans (blue + brown) so my mixtures were too weak.I chose Talens Van Gogh Ultramarine and Burnt umber because I have both in tubes, so it’s easier to get a large amount of a dark, intense mixture.My favorites are mixes of blue and brown. You can mix black using many different complementary dark colors.If you want to know more about this, I’ll link a good explanation by Mind of Watercolor. The interesting thing with watercolor is that you can actually get darker blacks by mixing several transparent colors, than by using the common black pigments.It’s a bit more even, but much warmer in tone, and not noticeably darker than Mars Black. I remembered I had an old tube of Louvre Ivory Black, which is a non-granulating pigment, so I tried that as well just in case.Getting a perfectly flat wash requires heavyweight watercolor paper that won’t buckle, and carefully applying many light washes (at least 5-6 layers).So I gave it another go, this time using Canson XL watercolor paper. My first attempt was really bad, after two layers it’s still pretty light.I knew going in that watercolor is not the best medium because it takes a lot of effort to get a dark, deep surface, I just wanted to see how it compared to others.Iron oxide pigment called Mars Black by Roman Szmal.I used this technique a lot in my sketchbook lately and I quite like the results!.Great for painting precise edges around a drawing since it’s not too runny.Very easy to apply, once you get the consistency right.Slightly reflective and has a warm satin sheen. ![]() It’s very even, one layer was enough to cover the surface with no gray areas.I tried another swatch with more water and there’s no visible difference.I add a tiny amount of water so it spreads more easily.Schminke Akademie Deep Black – student grade paint available at a decent price for a reasonably sized tube.I used gouache for the large black exploding blob on my mixed media drawing Dissolution Gouache ![]() I’m testing different mediums, not variations between brands. Different brands have comparable products. I use student-grade or artist-grade art materials that are available to me in the European Union. I don’t have every option in existence, but I don’t want to go buy more stuff. I’ll compare the mediums I already have at home. If one layer doesn’t produce a perfectly even surface because of my shoddy technique, I want to give it a fair chance so I’ll do an extra layer to even things out. I’ll use 2 layers at most because I’m not a patient person.
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