Best Professional Oil Paints

The Old Masters pallet, Academy TM Palette, includes both Old Masters historical pigments and Old Mast pigments produced centuries after the Old Masters; and in the 1920s two pallet-selected pigments were invented.

All the pigments and mediums used by Old Masters cannot be replicated, besides that we have not so much intent – as the “secrets” of Old Masters lie not in TOOLs, but in Methodies of Painting; that is why, using modern materials, we learn to paint like the Old Masters. Our range consists of the best colours you can rely on – all colours selected are dependent on the durability of the Colors and their aesthetic look.

Let us begin to study all of our palette of oil colours and oil pigments.

1. Titanium White

Whites are our palette’s most important and used colours. Nearly half of white colours are used in painting. Therefore it is very critical that the Whites are chosen and that consistency is not compromised. The Old Masters offers two choices. TM Palette Academy – White Titanium and White Zinc. In some cases, they are both effective and each is developed for various methods of painting. We may distinguish them approximately as Opaque White and Glazing White.

Let’s start with Titanium White, the whitest of all whites, that is very opaque, with very strong coverings. The concealed effect is about twice the white lead in the history of the Old Masters. For Titanium White it is easier to paint incorrect passages, while they are really dark. Titanium white has such disadvantages that it dries very slowly and is therefore able to turn yellow, particularly when adding extra oil to the paint.

Designers have to note, that Titanium White gives delicate mixtures of added ultramarine or cadmium. This White is perfect for thick and opaque underpainting. Titanium White belongs to the Titian Exclusive Palette. We’ll discuss in depth the palette of Titian later.

And just for the curious: in 1920, the white paint of titanium came to the market.

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2. Zinc White 

In the past, there have been several efforts to manufacture white paint from cleaner materials due to the toxicity of Lead White. In 1840 Zinc White was invented at a low price and non-poisonous. In other respects, Lead White will contend with this colour.

Zinc White is a cold clarity with a blue undertone drying white colour. It is not active in mixtures and economically illuminates most colours. White Zinc is a lightweight paint – it may be effectively used for Velaturas, a semi-transparent painting; Scumbling as well as Alla Prima.

The characteristics of Zinc White are both positive and negative.

Zinc White has a low toxicity, is entirely light resistant and is able to produce robust, long-lasting blends of steady paints.

Zinc Whites have very little covering ability, their drying time affects mixed drying times; they can brittle paint surfaces, appear to crack and ultimately induce lamination; and they also tend to absorb a significant quantity of oil. More or less opaquely applied layers can over time become translucent.

Paints that are coated with Zinc White should ideally not be stripped and rolled up from the stretcher bars.

The pluses and the minus in Titanium and Zinc Whites. The mix of the two will, however, compensate one another. When you combine both pigments and combine both pigments yourself, you can either perform or you can buy a pre-improved paint tube such as “Titanium white 2.”

3. Unbleached Titanium Dioxide 

Fast drying and extraordinary opacity make it suitable for undercarriage, especially for the image of flash; it provides a nice texture and a sleek surface. The colouring capacity is incredibly good and it is particularly helpful if you have a mistake to paint. In mixtures, it very easily lightens another colour, creating a stunning off-white darker, stone-like tone in mixtures of white.
Buff titanium can be substituted.

4. Lemon Yellow 

An excellent Average Drying Time pigment; has proved durable, lasting and not chemically responsive. However, it is TOXIC – you should keep your studio well-ventilated away from children (although you need to do this anyway). The colour is a transparent, vivid, slightly greenish acid yellow. It has tremendous control of tinting as an invisible and intense colour. It transforms into a bland orange when mixed with reds.

5. Yellow Lake 

Drying slowly and paint transparent. It has a heavy tinting ability, despite its openness. It has an extremely strong light-fastness, and it is continuous in colour, but it is much better from various sources – which is extremely permanent. The mystical colour of Yellow Lake is excellent for mixing and clear glazing layers. But because of the heavy tinting force, we should be careful about it – it’s a really dominant painting.

It can produce instantly more golden or greenish mixes in an undertone, even with limited amounts. It will increase the content without rendering them invisible in combination with Phthalocyanine Blue and Phthalocyanine Green. It becomes luminously opaque in blends of whites.

6. Indian Yellow 

The colour is drying for an average time. The colour itself is more orange than yellow. This is a transparent, clear, deep and radiant colour, well known for its glazing features. No other colour will substitute for Indian Yellow.

It will bring extraordinary vitality to the painting in thin finishing layers of glazing. A synthetic organic lake pigment can now be acquired to substitute the iconic original organic pigment produced in an uncommon manner. Cows were only fed with mango leaves to produce this colour. When the cows came to the sand they gathered, powdered, and cleaned dark, yellow tubes. Today the Indian Yellow equivalent equals the elegance of the original colour, but the tinting power is much higher. No blue colours blend it – it is brownish and will reduce the attractiveness of the mix. You should use Indian Yellow in glazing to its maximum extent.

7. Scarlet Lake 

It’s an edible, solid and cool purple-red drying paint that tends slightly to blue. The layer is semi-opaque and can be used for a variety of reasons – for firm underlay or in thin layers of glazing and also as part of a colour blend. The visual features of Scarlet Lake are also well-known among working artists.

8. Cadmium Red 

It’s still a realistic Quick Drying colour. The new category of artificially produced colours comprises cadmium reds. It’s dangerous, so keep it away from children’s reach and ventilate your studio. Red cadmium colours have a higher chemical composition than Yellow and Orange cadmium. The colours, bright and warm, are very rich. In my view, no other Reds will replace this gorgeous Color.

It has excellent protecting properties due to its opaque characteristics. For several years, all cadmiums have been prohibited, but pigments are always available and I assume that they will be still available because the properties of cadmium are outstanding and they should not be replaced. They are not completely compelling for a sudden decision to be taken.

9. Scheveningen Red Deep 

This colour is a fantastic replacement for Alizarin Crimson and visually suits it. Alizarin Crimson is a common paint among artists because of its brilliant colour, but it has a reputation for shifting and being inconsistent. Old Holland’s line of colours is Scheveningen Red Deep. This red paint is black, clear, and cool, with a blue or violet undertone. It may be mixed in with other Reds to darken and deepen them. It’s best for transparent glazes.

10. Ultramarine Blue 

It’s a colour that dries quickly. It’s incredible in every way because it’s a colour you can easily tint and mask. Ultramarine is one of the few mineral colours that is fully translucent, making it ideal for glazing. Without a doubt, it is the most stunning blue possible. There are no major variations in Ultramarine Blue and French Ultramarine.

Guimet, a French chemist, developed it as a synthetic replacement for the costly Lapis Lazuli pigment at the end of the 1820s. It was roughly a tenth of the expense of natural Lapis Lazuli. Natural ultramarine is much superior to synthetic ultramarine in terms of quality, but it is still a very expensive and rare colour on the market today. Artificial Ultramarine is classified as a low-cost colour. It closely resembles the colour, form, and quality of natural Ultramarine and can be used in place of it.

Before an artificial substitute was developed, owning an oil painting made of expensive blues was a status symbol. Gold was much more costly than ultramarine. Many painters never used blues in their paintings because they couldn’t afford it or couldn’t have it for practical purposes.

11. Phthalocyanine Blue

Is an incredibly stunning, clean, rich, and translucent paint that dries quickly. It was discovered by chance at the end of the twentieth century. As thickly applied, Phthalocyanine Blue seems to be a very black, deep blue. Building up the darkness with layer after layer of glazings, then applying the paint thickly in one go, would be preferable in my mind. We’ll get an extremely rich and vivid blue in galazes, and it’ll be very pure and translucent as a thin glaze.

It generates an amazing sky blue opaque colour when mixed with white. This new artificial pigment resembles Prussian Blue, but it is much more cyan and has a greenish tint in its unmixed state; and, like Prussian Blue colour, it has a propensity to dry looking bronze. For newcomers, Phthalo can be a real obstacle. It has tremendous tinting potential – in fact, it has the most dominant tint capacity of any colour in the series – and should be used with extreme care when mixed with other paints. It should be added in small amounts.

12. Phthalocyanine Green

Is a colour which dries quickly and is transparent. On our palette, we have yet another genius Phthalo paint with properties identical to our previous paint, Phthalocyanine Blue. It’s a gleaming, deep, and translucent pigment. It’s a ferocious acidic green with a blue undertone. It is the most powerful pigment in the range, along with Phthalo Blue. Its massive tint force takes over every mixture. You must get used to its incredibly strong powers and use extreme caution when using it. Beginners, be cautious! The paint works well in mixed color palettes and, above all, in fine-layer glazings. When used unmixed, Phthalocyanine Blue, for example, has a propensity to appear bronze when dry.

 The Most expensive oil paint colours

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For decades, oil paint has been used. It’s made from a drying oil, such as flaxseed, and pigment, with fillers and thickeners thrown in for good measure. These ingredients bond and thicken when combined and crushed to create permanent paint. Though the Renaissance is synonymous with the advent of oil painting, works using poppy-seed oil have been found dating back to the seventh century in Afghanistan. However, there is one major explanation why this paint has never been inexpensive: pigments are expensive.

1. Dry Pigment Oil & Ingredients

So, in a nice oil paint, you’ll like a high pigment loading and a high-quality pigment in that high pigment loading. So it doesn’t matter how much colour you have if it’s of poor quality. You’re searching for light fastness so it doesn’t fade, and there have been experiments on light fastness for decades, in reality, for certain pigments, so you won’t make a masterpiece just to have it totally washed out 50 years later.

The most expensive oil paints will contain up to 75% pigment, and the most valuable pigments have always been worth much more than their weight in gold. That’s why they take a lot of time and effort to find and develop.

2. History, Famous Colors in Oil Paint

Tyrian purple, a vivid pigment extracted from the glands of sea snails, was the preferred imperial colour in Roman times, and it took 12,000 snails to produce only 2 grammes of the hue. Mummy brown was originally made from the ground-up remains of Egyptian mummies in the 16th to 19th centuries, and although the colour was ideal for certain flesh tones, we soon ran out of mummies to use.

Pigments shift the expense significantly because, at the technical stage, you’ll have episodes, so you’ll actually have a series one, well, up to series seven. The higher the amount, the higher the price. This is due to the pigments, which are difficult to procure, come from a variety of sources, and are in high demand as a commodity in the real world.

3. Ultramarine: The Most Precious & Expensive

Ultramarine, which simply means “beyond the sea” and had to be mined in Afghanistan, was perhaps the most expensive. It was made of lapis lazuli, which can cost up to $30,000 a kilo in its purest pigment shape. The vivid blue was so highly regarded in the Renaissance that it was usually used for painting the Virgin Mary’s robes until a synthetic version was produced in 1826, and the gemstone was used to produce the dye until a synthetic version was created in 1826.

Many of these pigments today have synthetic forms, and while this makes them more affordable, others are still difficult to make. To make cobalt blue, for example, the materials must be heated to 1,200 degrees Celsius. These pigments are often difficult to deal with until you have them. Winsor & Newton has been producing oil paints for over 200 years, and its factory in France produces more than 5 million litres of paint per year.

4. Oil Paint Production Process

Producing paint is, in effect, similar to cooking. So you have grinding, where manufacturers combine materials such as pigments and other additives such as oil before milling. So, it is debatable. Machines of various types are used by producers. As a result, they use marble, ceramic, or steel. Testing the grain’s viscosity and, of course, the colour.

Any pigment must be handled in a specific way during this process. And it will need a certain quantity of oil, which varies depending on the pigment. You’ll have to grind it to a certain fineness, and even with the same pigment, the milling and grinding will change the colour you get. If you over grind it, you might end up with something duller, or if you grind it good, you might end up with a purple instead of a blue.

• It can take months or even years to perfect the analysis and testing for these colours.
• A lab creates small samples of each hue to test purity and light fastness.
• Over all, the consistency of oil paint must be consistent, as talented artists must ensure that the painting they are now working on can endure for hundreds of years.

Oil Paint Colors Prices

1. Dry Pigment Oil

Oils, acrylics, watercolours, egg gum infused ink, Cold Wax, and encaustic are only a few of the painting media that use colour. This style of paint would cost anywhere between $30 and $40.

2. History, Famous Colors in Oil Paint

Tyrian purple, the most common royal shade in Roman times, was a magnificent shade made from the organs of ocean snails, and only 2 grammes of the shading needed 12,000 snails. This style of paint would cost anywhere between $50 and $60.

3. Ultramarine: The Most Precious & Expensive

Ultramarine is the most desirable and expensive oil paint. This style of paint would cost between $20 and $30 for a 50ml container.

Best oil colors

If you’re an amateur or an experienced artist, you’ve always considered using oil paint. Oil paint is the signature medium of the Old Masters, from Rembrandt to Monet, thanks to its slow drying time, which allows artists to work with it for longer periods. Oil paint has existed in some way or another since ancient Greece, but it became common during the Northern Renaissance.

Oil paint is made up of pigments suspended in a drying oil—most commonly linseed oil—that can be combined with various mediums including turpentine to alter the consistency and sheen. Zinc oxide, sienna, umber, and cadmium are some of the more popular natural pigments. Since certain pigments are poisonous, it’s still a good idea to take care, even as synthetic pigments have become more lightfast in recent years.

Although oils are intimidating to many beginning painters, they are a tool that can open up a world of possibilities. Oil paint is one medium that seamlessly transforms from mediaeval painting to modern sculpture, from Alyssa Monks’ hyperrealistic canvases to Joshua Miels’ palette knife portraits.

So, if you’re considering switching from acrylics to oil paints or just want to try a different brand, we’ve compiled a list of the best oil paints to get you started on your way to being the next Van Gogh.

What to Consider When Selecting Oil Paint

Cost

The price gap between acrylic and oil paint is one of the most important. Oil paints are more expensive than acrylic paints because they use pure pigments. In reality, you’ll soon find that the price of a tube varies based on which pigment is inside and how much of it there is. When it comes to artist-quality paints, producers often use a number or letter scale to mark their colours, with a higher number or letter indicating a higher price due to the type of pigment used.

If you want to save money, student-grade oil paints are a good option, but they come at a cost. Fillers and stabilisers are mixed in with the dye and oil to save money. Although this lowers the cost of student colours, it can also affect the colour, which can also seem muddy when combined. Student-grade oil paints, on the whole, use synthetic hues rather than natural pigment, which may contribute to colour differences.

Artist-grade oil paints are manufactured from only pigment and linseed—or poppy—oil, and are designed to be as vivid and long-lasting as possible. Although professional quality paints can be more expensive, starting with smaller tubes or a limited colour palette would allow you to play with them without going overboard. You’ll need less paint to get the bright colours you like because the pigment load is lighter.

Texture and Consistency

Each brand will have its distinct texture, and it will be up to the artist to choose what fits best for them. Some oil paints are buttery and simple to apply on a palette, while others have a faint grain. Depending on what you’re looking for, each will yield fascinating outcomes.

The drying time is often influenced by consistency. Keep in mind that it will take anywhere from three months to a year for all of the layers of an oil painting to dry entirely. In general, stiffer paints dry faster than runnier paints. Often, bear in mind that certain colours can take longer to dry than others. Whites, for example, take longer to dry since they contain poppy oils. This oil is used as a substitute for linseed oil, which can turn yellow with time.

Best Student Grade Oil Paint

WINSOR & NEWTON

Winsor & Newton’s Winton Oil Colour is the brand’s student-quality oil paint and can be used in nearly every craft store. They’re reasonably priced for the amount of pigment they provide, and they’re also a smart alternative if you need a lot of colour. Winton Oil Colors are known for their mixability, and they’re a great way to get started with oils if you’re coming from acrylics. From cadmium red deep hue and French ultramarine to burnt sienna and titanium white, their 10-tube starter kit would supply you with a nice variety of colours for most designs. They also dry quickly, taking just 2 to 7 days. You might also pursue Winsor & Newton Artists’ Oil Colors as a level-up.

VANGOGH

Also as a student grade paint, Talens’ mid-range line comes in 66 colours and is recognised for its high quality. They are particularly suited for those painting in a wet-on-wet format since they have a thinner consistency.

GAMBLIN 1980

Gamblin is an American paint company known for producing high-quality oils that are also clean. For example, they don’t use lead in their white and have a line of solvent-free mediums, making the studio work better. Gamblin’s student grade line, 1980 Oil Color, is another choice for those seeking an introduction to oil painting. There are 40 shades to choose from, all of which are creamy and simple to blend.

GRUMBACHER

Grumbacher has been a popular paint brand among students since its founding in 1905. Considering the low price, each tubing contains a significant amount of pigment and tint. The Academy Oil Set of Ten provides a beginner oil painter with all of the required colours to get started.

Now we are moving forward to talk more about the best professional oil paints in the following…

Best Professional Oil Paints

BOB ROSS

Shouldn’t let the name fool you; this isn’t a ruse. Bob Ross oil paints are not only an enjoyable novelty named after the creator of The Joy of Painting, but they’re also a fantastic mid-priced oil paint choice. While the pigment load isn’t as high as some other artist-grade paints, they are reasonably priced and come in wide, 150 ml tubes. The durability, of course, is ideal for Ross’ wet-on-wet technique.

WILLIAMSBURG

Many professional artists swear by Williamsburg for its dense, gritty quality and incredibly high pigment load. The company was established in the 1980s by a Brooklyn painter and was purchased by Golden in 2009, but the output has stayed consistent. Williamsburg oil paints are well worth the money for their colour consistency. “When you want to be able to see expressive brush strokes, it just helps to choose one of the best,” one reviewer says. This is one of the Best Professional Oil Paints.

SENNELIER

Sennelier has been around since 1887 and is known for being the painter of inspiration for artists such as Cezanne, Matisse, and Picasso. Safflower oil, rather than linseed, is used in Sennelier oil paints, giving them a satin finish and preventing yellowing. It also adds a few minutes to the drying time. There are 144 colours in the collection, and if you’re ever in Paris, you can visit the original Sennelier shop, which is located directly across the street from the Louvre.

BLOCKX

Speaking of Best Professional Oil Paints, Blockx has been produced in Belgium since 1865 and is a top-tier oil paint at top-tier prices. Blockx paints are known for their buttery quality and are assured to be ideally lightfast thanks to hand-grinding pigments on stone mills. Linseed is used to make iron oxides, earths, and whites, while poppy oil is used to keep the colours from yellowing.

MICHAEL HARDING

The premium prices reflect the high pigment load that provides intense colour. This British company was established by an artist in London. The good thing is that since there are no fillers, a tube will last a long time. They also imply that the paint won’t flake or chip with age. Check out a single tube to see how it compares if you want to dip your toe in the pool. You will never be able to go there.

SCHMINCKE MUSSINI

Schmincke Mussini oil paints are made of a conventional resin and linseed oil mix that is said to cure uniformly and avoid wrinkling. They also have a good range of translucent and semi-transparent shades, which is ideal for glaze makers.

OLD HOLLAND

Old Holland, one of the most dependable brands in oil paint, has been around since 1667 and takes pride in continuing the legacy of great Dutch masters like Rembrandt and Vermeer. All of their pigments, like Blockx’s, are ground with a mortar, which accounts for a large part of the high price tag for these pigment-rich paints. The colour saturation is unrivalled, thick and rigid.

JACK RICHESON

Jack Richeson oil paints are renowned for being inexpensive without sacrificing quality, making them one of the better oil paints for professionals. In reality, to ensure good quality, all of the paints are made in small batches. Richeson Shiva Oils will not darken, purple, fade, or crack as a result of this.