Dan's mention of teaching the girl how to palette her brush brought me to wonder what form of palette the folks use. Do you use a different type palette for different type of work?
I use the folded card type paint cups which are easy to use with a mahl stick, but most of the time I use a rectangular shaped one with holders for two small cups and a clipboard clamp to hold the material I use for paletting the brush.
I worked for a Sign Studio in Bermuda.....The owner, a Black Bermudian, did his apprenticeship in England.
He never used a palette. He had two apprentices in his shop that would mix the paint to a good brushing consistancy. The paint would be poured into small glass paint cups. He dipped his brush into the paint and formed it on the edge of the cup.
I never could figure out how he could get such sharp corners on his lettering.
Posted by George Perkins (Member # 156) on :
3 oz Dixie cups, palette on the inside of the cup. This is the method I use for most all lettering and striping. Back when I used a lot of big 3/4 and 1" flats I used a magazine. Never used a mahl stick, my left arm serves that purpose. I will break out a magazine if I'm doing some tight really fine line striping, but for 1/8 or even 1/16, the inside of the cup works just fine. I always premix the paint whether striping or lettering. Too much time spent on 18 wheelers over the years, palettes, thinner cups and mahl sticks are just too much to be dragging up and down the ladder.
Posted by Si Allen (Member # 420) on :
I use cat food cans! I pour in about a half ounce of paint and a few drops of Penetrol or Edge. held at a slight angle, it leaves most of the bottom for paletting. When thy dry overnite, they can bu used again. If all the paint isn't used up, simply stack them...seems to seal them quite well.
Werks fer me!
Posted by Brad Ferguson (Member # 33) on :
Rove:
I'm a mahl stick kind of guy. Left-handed also. I hold paint in a 3 oz. paper cup which perfectly fits into the top of a small frozen orange juice can, the paper type. The can keeps me from crushing the cup. I premix in the cup and palette on a piece of cardboard held under the cup in my mahlstick hand. I have also used gold leaf booklets for paletting (I throw away the gold )
Brad in Kansas City
Posted by John Grenier (Member # 3816) on :
I don"t use a palette for lettering and havn't for a long long time. I use 1/2 oz. and 1oz. portion cups (you know like the tartar sauce comes in) that are available at retaurant supplies outlets. Smart and Final on the west coast, Gordon Food Service here in the Midwest. You can get caps and the cups are clear so you can see the colors. They last a day or two before the paint melts the cup. The black cups are tougher if that is important. I will say I use glossy mags for a palette when I stripe.
I my neighborhood was Carl Malmquist who painted until he was 93 and he taught me to fold a palette cut from a shelaced index card. Narrow cup with a flap over your thumb while you hold your mahl stick. Course most of the time I watched Carl he had a soup can with the paint skin bent back and used a yard stick for a mahl stick and paint just gobbed all over the handle of the brush and his hands and shirt and shoes and dog and car and car seat and bumper and trunk lid and floor but only where it was supposed to be on his work. I miss Carl.
John
Posted by David Harding (Member # 108) on :
I use the one on the bottom of the page in Corel and Flexi. Now's the time for Raymond Chapman to jump in with: "That's 'cause he don't hand letter!"
Well, when we are painting a pictorial on a sign, I use cat food cans, plastic cups, the clear backing from Anchor sandblast mask, whatever I need at the time.
Posted by Bruce Bowers (Member # 892) on :
I use a reader's digest, cut in half on my home made fancy schmancy paint pallette stand. The holes are drilled to hold the little plastic dose cups. I use a stainless steel sauce cup for thinner.
It is very cool. It better be... I made it for myself. If you can't make cool stuff for yourself, then why even bother, you know?
Posted by Bob Stephens (Member # 858) on :
I use the phone book from years past. I just tear off the page when Im done and start fresh on the next one.
Posted by Frank Magoo (Member # 3950) on :
Bodyshop supply houses offer a bondo board to their bodymen customers, I take that paper, which is onion paper and doesn't soak up paint, like a phonebook will, cut it half and install the working half onto my trick three hole laser-lines pro-pallette. When done w/color I'm using, I tear off top sheet and start on next. The most important thing is does is to repel paint, paint won't soak into the paper, there-fore your pallette stays "fresh" so to speak and not all knotty from soaked up, dried paint. Always smooth to brush. I also carry this pallette in left(mahl-stick)hand when I'm working, no problems. The only thing so far I've heard that I disagree with is; I don't pre-mix my paint other than to get it flowable if to stiff at first, other than that, I only add thinner as needed throughout job. Since I've started this routine, I've discovered solution to a multitude of problems that existed prior to switching techniques. Paint actually will flow further w/o thinner, I know, let the rants and flamefest start, but it's true. Don't beleive me, go try it for yourself, it's true.
Posted by timi NC (Member # 576) on :
Here locally they have this freebie apartment guide book that is about 3"x 8" and 1/2" thick,..all varnished magazine paper,...I cut one in half so I have a book about 3"x4" and use it,..just tear off sheets as I go,....can keep it in my mahlstick hand if I use one or hold it with my left hand if I work hand over hand,....besides it keeps my landlord wondering If I'm gonna stay here when I leave them layin around the basement too,....
Posted by Sheila Ferrell (Member # 3741) on :
I recently gotta pro-pallete .. pretty nifty lil' thing . . .I've used it a few times.
I seldom pallete on anything other than the inside of the cup or the skin of the paint in the actual paint can. Sometimes I just grab a peice of scrap aluminum and use that.
When I'm doing pictorials I use aluminum scraps a lot to mix paint on.
For large amounts of paint I use gal. & qt. size coffee cans, yogurt & butter bowls . . . but mostly for mixing, unless lettering big stuff on-site. Don't pallete too much on coffee cans due to the sharp inside edge tryin' to eat up my brush.
I use yogurt cups, butter bowls and for smaller amounts of paint, apple sauce and jello cups, and medical 'dose' cups. These latter 3 types of containers are the only kind I save that don't come with lids.
I save a lotta applesauce and jello cups, & butter bowls.
My Mom, then my Dad kept me supplied with coffee cans. I need a new source now.
My sister-in-law with family of 8, keeps me well supplied in all those various sizes of yogurt cups, and more butter bowls.
Posted by Mark Matyjakowski (Member # 294) on :
I uesd to use old SignBusiness mags, that way as I would make my way through I rip out the pages with the eyecandy (before I slop them). Now I use Guitar Center advertising catalogs (basically the same thing as the apartment finders Timi mentioned, Harris turned me onto those a while back) My son and I are both on the GC mailing list so I get fresh pallets delivered to my mailbox every couple weeks.
Posted by Jeff Ogden (Member # 3184) on :
I usually mix the paint to the right consistency then palette on the cup, but I do use a palette when painting stripes or painting pictorials. Sometimes I hold the cup and palette together with a mahl stick in my left hand, if I'm lettering with a truck flat.
Don't laugh, but I have about 6 palettes (about6"x8") made out of foamboard 'cause it's light. I have one for blues, one for reds, etc., and I use them over and over, and on both sides. I get into color alot when I paint, so having these palettes provides an interesting history of what colors I have been using. I even drill holes in my paint stir sticks, and have them hanging at my paint bench...you guessed it...one for red, one for green, etc.
Sometime I might frame up one of my palettes...they look pretty interesting after about a years worth of paint swabs.
[ January 23, 2005, 10:59 AM: Message edited by: Jeff Ogden ]
Posted by Sheila Ferrell (Member # 3741) on :
LOL Jeff . . . I'm bettin' in a hundred years, those 'framed art' pieces will bring a lot of money. . .art critiques will be examining them with intrigue and raving about the 'artistically deliberate & precise yet loosely creative genius' involved in these works . . . Posted by Jon Butterworth (Member # 227) on :
Old phone book cut into 1/3rd blocks with a jig-saw. Learnt that one at Fred's Meet. Wondered what all these mutilated phone books were laying around until I saw one being used.
I also have a pile of 6" square coro scraps. They are light enough to hold under a paint cup, especialy doing pictorials.
Shiela, I gotta start framing my shorts. Especially the front right hand side. Talk about "abstract" paintings! I have a habit of wiping paint drips etc with my thumb then transfering them to the nearest object ... my shorts
[ January 24, 2005, 03:29 AM: Message edited by: Jon Butterworth ]
Posted by Ian Stewart-Koster (Member # 3500) on :
for striping, I use sardine tins- one the right way up to hold the paint you're using, and another upside down so you can palette out the brush. And another with turps in it to lay the dagger in for brief breaks. I don't carry them tho'!
for lettering, whatever tin can I can reach close by that I've trimmed down with tin snips. Sometimes it's a jam tin, cat food, condensed-milk, or a soft-drink can. Preferably something 2" diameter roughly.
for lots of blended work, any glossy magazine that won't absorb the paint much, especially stock & share annual reports and other junk mail..
Posted by Rovelle W. Gratz (Member # 4404) on :
I once saw a Pastel exibit in Denver.
They had framed three of the paper napkins that the artist used to wipe his pastels. The napkins were the fancy kind with the embossed edges.
They looked pretty good as an abstract study.
Posted by Jackson Smart (Member # 187) on :
When I am using 1-Shot to letter with, I use a small dixie cup and a non-solicited magazine as a pallete. I also use a mahl stick. If it is inconvient to use a mag I pallete off the edge of the cup. I premix my paints before brushing.
When using acrylic paints I like to use a plastic plate, usually the blue ones. It is eisier to see the paints while mixing.
Posted by Ricky Jackson (Member # 5082) on :
"Back in the day" when I hand lettered, I used Cool Whip lids. They have the little lip that keeps the paint in and makes it easy to hold onto and they are flexible, you can have a bunch of them without taking up a lot of room and when the paint dries you can pop off the paint - especially if there is several layers. They are also very cheap. It's a great deal cause you get the lid, the plastic salad bowl and the white stuff inside
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