Summer Colors!

6/29/23 Pink is the new white!

Occasional morning June gloom notwithstanding, there’s no doubt about it – summer is here, and I’m celebrating with a bunch of new Uglybooks colors! (Do I sound like Uglybooks marketing copy? Sorry, I don’t mean to – I just love colored pages!)

First up is this fabulous hot pink that came in a mystery pack and apparently is not available as a standard release – yet? Or maybe it’s from a previous release that’s now out of stock? I don’t know, but I sure hope to see it again! The color is close to Mall Madness, but not quite. I’m so curious who their paper supplier is with so many colors!

Summer colors -- bring 'em on!

In related news, I’m getting increasingly fed up with the unreliable behavior of Sakura Gelly Roll, which has long been my go-to opaque white gel pen. It works great, until it doesn’t – usually in the middle of a sketch. And maybe I’m relying too much on basic white as the lightest value anyway. Color deserves color! Inspired by many Uglybooks users (whose work I see by following the Uglybooks hashtag on Instagram) who favor opaque paint markers on these brilliantly colored pages, I’m going to start using alternatives. In the sketch above, I tried the pale pink Pentel Milky Brush Pen that I got for petal-peeping season. I’m not a general fan of Uni Posca Paint Markers, but I’ll give them a try, too.

Finally, it’s time to shake up my daily-carry watercolor pencil palette. So focused on watercolor paints in June during the 30x30 Direct Watercolor challenge, I hadn’t been paying attention to my pencil palette at all. My long-time go-to for the sunny side of trees has been Caran d’Ache Museum Aquarelle Light Olive (245), which is a lovely, natural green that works for all kinds of spring and summer foliage. Suddenly one day I realized I was tired of it. Now that I have Derwent Inktense to expand my palette, I had a couple more warm greens to audition (though not as many as I had hoped). I’m going to try Apple Green (1400). For the cool green, I’m staying with Museum Aquarelle Dark Phthalocyanine Green (719).

I still like Inktense Nightshade as a secondary triad violet, but just for a change, I’m going to try the slightly cooler Violet (800). I’m keeping Museum Aquarelle Cornelian (850) for the cool orange, and for the warm, I’m trying Inktense Mango (245).

New secondary triad palette

For the primary triad, the only change I made was to swap out Museum Aquarelle Purplish Red (350) for Inktense Fuchsia (700). I also now carry Inktense Hot Red (410) as a more conventional red for cases when it’s important to me to use an unmixed, traditional red.

New primary triad palette

Also in my daily-carry are two oddball essentials: Heavy-equipment yellow (Museum Aquarelle Gold Cadmium Yellow 530) and Inktense Pink Flamingo (405), which has surprised me in its usefulness beyond spring flowers.

Summer daily-carry palette

Summer sticker from Draplin Design Co.