How To Use Nicholson's Peerless Watercolors
Nicholson's Peerless Watercolors have been hand-made since 1885 right here in the U.S.A. Since that time our paints have become the favorite watercolor of for artists on the move. Our paints have been used by Jerry Garcia of The Grateful Dead, countless museums needing to restore old photographs, and quite literally thousands of wonderful watercolor artists. Our paints are also 100% non-toxic unlike some pigment based paints, which means they are perfect for your children to express their creativity with! Our paints look a little different than traditional watercolors and the aim of this post is to give you a nice starting-point for painting with our hand-made watercolors! The important word in that sentence is "starting-point" with Peerless Watercolors the sky is the limit when it comes to creative ways to paint with them!
The main thing to remember about our paints is that one side is the concentrated paint and the other side is a wash of the paint that approximates the final color of the paint. I say approximate just because the example wash, in this case, is not on any sort of watercolor paper. It is on a much more robust material, therefore the color will look a little brighter on whatever paper you choose to use.
In general there are 3 main ways to paint with our watercolors.
The first way is to fill each individual water reservoir in a palette with water then snip a little piece off of the Drycolor sheet and submerge it in the reservoir. Doing so allows the paint to be freed from the sheet and into the water it goes and it is ready to paint with! If you want a more intense color simply add a bigger piece of the Drycolor sheet!
The second way is to bring the water directly to the color side of the Drycolor sheet with your brush. The Drycolor sheets are made in a way that they can be used as the palette themselves! No need for any extra hardware! This makes them great for painters that like to travel to their subjects, paint on their way to work, or busy painters that need to grab spare seconds in their day in order to paint. After you're done painting simply allow the sheet to dry and you are good to go! A great addition to this method is the Niji (or any other water brush) water brush we sell. This makes your painting kit even more adaptable and portable.
The third way to use our paints is a hybrid of the first two methods. You can fill the reservoirs of a palette with water and then use your brush to bring paint back to the reservoir with the water in it. Mixing and blending your colors in your palette instead of on your paper (Peerless colors are fully transparent and therefore you'll never get a murky mess when blending them on the paper, only new hues and variations in the colors!)
I hope some of you may have found this helpful! Like I said at the beginning of this article, there are hundreds of ways to use our colors and we love seeing all the experimentation our customers go through to discover new ways to express themselves with our paints. With Peerless watercolors even the mistakes and failed experiments end up looking great (or at the very least "interesting" as my wife would say!) Below are some great videos that demonstrate using our paint!
"When it comes to your art, be Peerless!"
- Dalton