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home made palettes
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Message
Posted
Why buy expensive lightweight ,special surface palettes when you can make one . Get a piece of hardboard ( not anything else ) and saw it to the similar shape of comfy ones , maybe the three point ones. smooth and round off the edges and thumbhole. Then rub linseed oil into the surface so its colour changes ,leave to dry then
do the same again a few times. thats it. The surface will improve even more as you use it and dont use a lot of turps to clean it as its the linseed oil which is the sympathetic surface. Mine dates back to the fifties but is the more usual shape and nice and big too.
Syd
Posted
Well said, Syd! My favourite palette, and a big one, was made for me by a friend with a jigsaw - it's actually plywood rather than hardboard, and works as well as a piece of well-seasoned mahogany, which either you can't get at all these days, or is phenomenally pricey. I'm very fond of it not only because it works so well, but also because it reminds me of my old mate - who is now many miles away tending sheep up in Cumbria: maybe I should have made it myself, but I'm the lad who spent a whole term trying to make a tent-peg, and another one making a scissor rack....
I have confessed to a desire for an air-wave palette elsewhere on POL: beautifully sculpted pieces of work which mould to the body. But honesty compels me to admit that they'd be no better than what I've already got, and no better than your hardboard palette either. The important thing is room - there's nothing worse than a palette that's too small for your needs, so that you have to have several of them on the go: a big palette, with plenty of mixing space, pays for itself again and again. I'm not a huge exponent of the Bob Ross range of materials, but there are at least two pieces of equipment in the range that I'd happily recommend: one is the big palette, the other is the painting knife with its semi-rigid blade and two edges: you can keep the painting method itself, but these tools are well worth acquiring.
Posted
I make my palettes from 6mm MDF cut into rectangles, one size (16x12ins) for the studio and a smaller size that fits into my pochade box for plein air painting. I don't bother with thumb holes or any shaping and have never found this to be a problem. Once cut the MDF is given a couple of coats of house paint mid grey undercoat which is allowed to dry thoroughly before being coated with 2 or 3 coats of clear varnish. The result is a mid-tone palette which is helpful for judging tone in the paint being mixed. Over a period the surface gains some staining but it is a quick job to rub down, re undercoat and varnish to 'new' standard if necessary. Cheap and effective I have a studio and plein air palette in use at any time and a spare just in case (of what I'm not sure! but it can be used if one of the others needs refurbishing).
The grey undercoat is a small tin bought years ago and the sheet of MDF I bought in 2012 isn't even a quarter used yet so I think I have some time to go before any further expenditure, especially as I haven't had to make a new palette since making my current set in 2012.
