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Shin Han Pass watercolour/ gouashe hybrid
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Posted
I've just bought some of these & I'm very pleased so far. They were cheap but if used fairly thinly they are surprisingly transparent but still rich in colour. The colour just floods out with very little effort. When used more thickly however they become very opaque, even more so than designer gouache. The only drawback I can find is that when used thickly they have a matt powdery appearance. I have been using mainly Windsor & Newton artists watercolours. Has anybody else used them & if so what do you think?
Posted
Andy H2 (4/17/2015)Wasn't there some query of the light fastness or the lasting quality of Shin Han paints - I seem to remember something. I don't think any watercolour paint should have a matt powdery effect - rather contradicts the whole purpose of transparent watercolour, don't you think?
I've just bought some of these & I'm very pleased so far. They were cheap but if used fairly thinly they are surprisingly transparent but still rich in colour. The colour just floods out with very little effort. When used more thickly however they become very opaque, even more so than designer gouache. The only drawback I can find is that when used thickly they have a matt powdery appearance. I have been using mainly Windsor & Newton artists watercolours. Has anybody else used them & if so what do you think?
Posted
From experience I have found that Gouache leaves powdery residue on paintings, and when used like watercolours you can never attain the sparkle that only watercolours give.
Over the years I have used W&N, DR, and Conte Gouache from time to time, but nothing beats true watercolours for me.
However, I found that you can use the powdery-ness to your advantage, years ago I did a study of a purple Anemone in which the Gouache left the petals looking velvety and quite realistic.
I have not tried anything from Shin Han Pass, but I always advocate, try anything once.
Paint some of each colour in 2" squares graduating the colours to give a good example on watercolour paper and leave it in a bright sunlit room, not in direct sunlight, just to see in say over a few months how they fair up?
Posted
I've only just noticed this post. I was a little concerned when Jacksons first stocked this make of watercolour so I rang them up and said that before I ordered any colours, I wanted to know the precise pigments that were used in them.
They very kindly sent me a colour chart and on the back was exactly what I was asking for.
I have scanned the relevant part of the chart they sent me showing the pigments in the early selection they offered. Since then they have added a few and changed a few but I'm sure they have not basically changed their content.
Hope this helps you to decide on their permanence, I have ticked the ones I have chosen and subsequently bought. They have proved very reliable indeed and I can recommend them.
John
Posted
Interesting - thank you. The colours you really can't trust are much the same as are to be found in other conventional gouache selections - in particular, Opera, and the madder reds: useful for illustration work which is intended for reproduction, so doesn't need a long life in itself, but entirely unsuitable for any work that is intended for display. These are indicated by one star in the attached list. Colours like Opera - and Geranium Lake, a very powerful red still available from some suppliers but unfortunately extremely prone to fading - are probably never going to be anything other than very fugitive. Based on this list (although we need to remember there could be something more current), I'd approach these colours with considerable caution - always look at the label, and if you're hoping for paint that will give you a painting you can hang, avoid anything with just one star, and use as few of anything under three stars as you can.
I am always haunted by the memory of a gentleman who offered two of his gouache paintings in an art shop I helped to run many years ago: whatever we did, however we showed or stored the paintings, they faded drastically in a matter of months: it just seemed to me a total waste of time and talent - we didn't even like selling those paints, knowing that he was going to use them for this purpose; and of course selling the paintings was virtually impossible, because we had to warn potential purchasers that unless they kept them in a darkened room, they WOULD inevitably fade.
There are permanent gouache paints available now, eg from Winsor and Newton, and they should mix satisfactorily with the permanent Shin Han paints - I would stick rigidly to those unless you're using the paint for botanical or fashion reproduction or cartoons, where permanence isn't an issue.
Posted
Actually, there are some real peculiarities in this list - Opera, for example, is given one star, which is what you'd expect the usual pigment in Opera Rose to have; and yet it's PR122, which is a quinacridone violet, and a very reliable colour.... I don't know what the RV 10 designation means: presumably Red Violet 10, which isn't a designation I've encountered before. Then you get PR 60 used in the Bright Rose, which isn't good news: but then this is a luminous colour, which you wouldn't expect to be lightfast. And you've also got PB 15, which is the very reliable Pthalo Blue, used in both the Peacock Blue and Cerulean Blue. Hmmm! A bit of a mix..... I think, if I had any of these colours to play with, I'd do my own lightfastness tests on them before trusting anything below a three star rating. Or type in the pigment numbers to Google, and check them on the Handprint site. I wouldn't want to put anyone off Shin Han at all - they do interesting ranges of paint; but I think users of gouache always need to do a bit of homework of their own before settling on a palette - it's only in recent years that gouache has been taken at all seriously as a permanent painting medium, even though it's been used for centuries, and buyers still need to beware.
Posted
The have painted watercolours which contained large areas of gouche colour. These I always mix myself from permanent watercolour paints mixed with white body colour (W & N Designer's permanent white). I don't trust anything sold specifically as gouache or designer's colours as none are intended for anything but temporary work. Designers usually photograph what they have done and do not prize the preparatory colour sketches.
I have an interesting book on watercolour from the 1930s by Richmond & Littlejohn still with tipped in illustrations and it is surprising how many of them contain large areas of gouache painting. Any artist using tinted paper would be obliged to rely to some extent on gouache colour, David Cox, the Norwich School and even Turner on occasion.
John