
ABOUT SUPPLIES
I am all about sticking to a budget and finding a great deal, and I buy generic store brands all the time. However, in watercolor, it is generally true that you get what you pay for. Artist grade paint, brushes, and paper will far outperform student grade materials. Your paint will flow better, pigmentation will be more saturated, your paper will stay wet longer, and your brushes will retain their shape better and hold more water. In short, your experience will be a lot easier and more pleasurable, and your results will be better when you are working with high quality supplies. For this reason, I firmly believe that students need good quality materials almost more than experienced artists do. The following is a list of some of my favorite supplies, along with links to purchase them if you are interested. I am not affiliated with any of the online stores or art companies, and I do not receive any compensation for sharing this information. These are simply my personal recommendations based on my experience. Enjoy!
PAPER
There are generally two kinds of watercolor paper on the market – paper made from 100% cotton, and paper made from wood pulp. 100% cotton paper is the one to look for. It stays wet longer, allowing you the time to work in a more relaxed way without rushing against time. Wood pulp paper will dry too quickly, and it will dry unevenly in patches, creating unwanted dry spots as you are working. If the packaging does not say 100% cotton, I would avoid it; it will just be frustrating to work with.
Also, watercolor paper can be found in three different finishes; hot press, cold press, and rough. This refers to the finished texture of the paper. Hot press paper is very smooth to the touch. It is good for finely detailed paintings, or for those who want to add handwritten lettering over their painting once it is dry. It is also good for those who want to scan their paintings later and not have any rough texture showing up in the scan. Cold press is my favorite, and is the most commonly used by watercolor artists. It has a pleasing, moderate texture and is good for all types of paintings. Rough paper has a more pronounced texture and is great for looser paintings. The surface can be used to create beautiful textural effects in the painting. It’s a little harder to achieve a smooth fine line on a rough piece of paper, so this is usually not recommended for precise detailed work.
Watercolor paper also comes in several thicknesses. The heavier it is, the more expensive it is – but also the more durable. 300lb paper is very stiff, almost like light chipboard. It will stand up to lots of water without buckling and warping. 140lb is the most commonly used thickness. It feels like heavy cardstock and is a great multipurpose weight for all kinds of painting. 90lb is much thinner, and has a greater tendency to warp and buckle when using lots of water. It’s best for wet-on-dry techniques, or I use it to create swatch charts and practice work.
Finally, there are several ways to purchase your paper. It can come as a regular pad of paper, a watercolor block, large loose sheets, or on a giant roll. Watercolor blocks tend to be the most expensive. A “block” is basically a pad of paper that has been glued together on all four sides rather than just at the top. There is a small gap in the glue on one side so that you can slide a palette knife under your finished painting and remove it from the block when it’s done. This eliminates the need to tape your paper to a board, and it’s a convenient way to paint on the go. A watercolor pad is usually 12 sheets of paper, glued together along the top edge like any pad of paper. You just tear off a sheet, tape it to a board, and away you go. Buying paper in large sheets or on a roll is the least expensive way to buy paper in bulk. You will have to cut the sheets yourself down to the size you want, but you can save money this way. This is how I purchase my paper now.
My favorite paper to work with is the Arches brand, and it is generally considered the best on the market. I usually buy the bright white paper rather than the natural white, because bright white tends to show the paint colors a little more vividly. However, the difference is really not that significant and either color will work beautifully. Another good brand is Fabriano Artistico. Some people have had good results with Bee paper or Fluid paper, but I have not enjoyed either one personally. Once you try Arches, it’s hard to go back!
Browse artist grade watercolor papers from Blick Art Materials
BRUSHES:
Make sure you purchase brushes that are designed for watercolor. Acrylic or oil brushes will be stiffer and will not hold as much water as you need them to. What you want is a brush that holds a good amount of water and paint so that you don’t have to keep reloading too often, and a brush that will come to a good fine point at the end so that you can create everything from the finest line to a thicker stroke.
Recommended shapes and sizes: To start out with, the most commonly used watercolor brushes are flat, square wash brushes (good for straight lines and edges, horizontal or vertical strokes such as horizon lines and shimmers on the water, and for filling a large area with clear water quickly), and pointed round brushes (good for all watercolor work in general). I recommend a 1 to 1 ½” flat wash brush, and several pointed rounds ranging from size 0 to 10.
The very best watercolor brushes are made from natural animal hair, namely Kolinsky sable. Squirrel hair is excellent as well. These are more expensive brushes, but they hold water amazingly well and retain their shape beautifully. My personal favorites are the Winsor and Newton Series 7 Kolinsky Sable Pointed Rounds and the Silver Black Velvet (squirrel) line. These are top of the line brushes, and if you are serious about painting, they are a great investment.
Watercolor brushes are also available made from synthetic fibers, or a blend of natural hair and synthetic fibers. These are also great, especially those that are made to mimic sable or squirrel. My personal favorites are the Princeton Neptune line, which are softer (synthetic squirrel) and good for loose washy applications. Other lines that I have enjoyed are the Princeton Heritage series and the Princeton Aqua Elite series. Both are slightly stiffer brushes, so they are good for detail work. I have a 2” flat wash brush by Princeton Heritage that I love for quickly covering large areas of my paper with clear water.
You may also see “water brushes” available in stores or online. These are basically plastic brushes with nylon bristles and a barrel that you can fill with water. The barrel releases water down through the brush itself so that you can paint on the go without having a water jar to rinse your brush in. These are OK for travel but I don’t recommend them for serious painting.
Browse natural hair brushes from Blick Art Materials
Browse synthetic brushes from Blick Art Materials
PAINT:
I always recommend buying the best paint you can afford. Professional grade paint will be less likely to fade over time, it will flow better on the paper, and the pigmentation will be stronger. Student grade paints tend to be chalky, opaque, and have added fillers in them. An exception (in my opinion) is the Winsor and Newton Cotman line of student grade paints. These are very good for student grade paints, and would be a great place to start if you are watching your budget but want to explore a wide range of color choices – or if you aren’t sure you want to get really into watercolor and you just want a good paint to experiment with. My favorite professional paints are by Daniel Smith, M. Graham, Holbein, and Winsor and Newton (professional series). Mostly I use Daniel Smith, but there are occasionally colors that are only carried by other brands, or I happen to like the shade better in a certain brand.
Paint can be purchased in tubes or as dry cakes in small pans. Either one is fine. Pans are more convenient for traveling or painting on the go; tubes are more versatile because you can use the paint fresh out of the tube, which can make it more vibrant, or you can squeeze the paint out into an empty pan and dry it for a few days to have your own travel pans. I tend to buy the tubes and then pan them myself because otherwise I end up squeezing out more paint than I need and it goes to waste. Tip: if you buy tubes, save a couple of the lids when throwing away an empty tube. That way if you happen to lose the lid of a full tube, you can replace it before your paint dries out. My favorite palettes for paint pans are here, and I love the full sized pans rather than half pans because it’s easier to get larger brushes in there.
Each paint tube will come with information on it that will help you understand that paint’s properties. If it’s not directly on the tube, I’ve found that Amazon’s product descriptions are usually very thorough on this subject. Below, I will try to demystify some of these descriptors for you.
Lightfastness: how well a paint will stand up to natural daylight without fading. Lightfastness ratings range from I (excellent) to IV (poor).
Transparency: literally how transparent the paint is, or how well the paint allows what’s underneath it to shine through. Opaque and semi-opaque paints can appear duller and muddier in mixes; transparent paints mix clearly and cleanly. Many watercolorists value transparent paints for their luminosity and easy mixing properties. A side note: if you run across gouache, know that it is a water-based paint similar to watercolor, but it is entirely opaque and has different applications.
Staining: staining paints will actually stain the paper and are very hard to lift or remove. They are good for painting over with another color, because you aren’t likely to disturb the layer underneath. Non-staining colors are much more forgiving because they can be lifted off or lightened after they are dry by applying clear water and wiping with a damp brush or paper towel.
Granulation: watercolor pigments are sometimes synthetic, and sometimes they are made from plant material or minerals/rocks that have been finely ground. Some of these pigments are sedimentary and will actually settle into the texture of the watercolor paper. This creates a mottled or textured look once the paint has dried. These paints are excellent for subjects that should have some texture to them, like rocks or wood or buildings. Non-granulating paints are smooth and clear when dry.
Paint tubes will also have a code on them indicating the actual pigments that are inside. Some paints are made up of several pigments mixed together. Others are made from single pigments. Single pigment paints are valued because they are cleaner to mix together.
Below is an example of a swatch strip I made for Daniel Smith Cascade Green. As you can see from the paint sample, it is a granulating paint. It is made from two pigments mixed together: PBR7 (raw sienna) and PB15 (phthalo blue). The raw sienna has settled into the crevices of the paper because it is a granulating pigment, whereas the phthalo blue remains smooth as the paint dries. This creates some stunning effects in underwater scenes. Below that I have written the codes for Lightfastness (1, excellent), Staining (3, medium staining), Granulating (yes), and Transparency (semi-transparent).
