Getting Off The Umbers
Hi, my name is Lisa, and I’m an umber addict. I prefer raw umber, but burnt umber is nice too, in a pinch. Sometimes I will plan a whole painting around a nice warm brown underpainting.
But! Umbers will turn on you. The next time you come to them, they’ve “sunk in,” that particularly umber-ish habit of drying much lighter and cooler than they looked when wet, or than they will look again when varnished. Boo! Also, since they dry much faster than other pigments, you’ll sometimes find that halfway through your day, the umber is tacked up, but the adjacent paint is not, and if you stroke over it - it will pull up or stack up in very unattractive and edge-defying ways.
For those reasons I sought an alternative, and ws pleased to discover 2 nice ones - ivory black + Winsor Newton burnt sienna, and sap green + WN alizarin crimson hue. I use the WN burnt sienna because it’s transparent, same with the crimson. Both of those combinations make luscious, deep, dark browns that are transparent and dry at a slower pace.
Do you have a brown combo or pigment you like? Post a comment.
The following was done from life, no umbers, 3 sessions. 9 x 12.
November Rose, 12 x 9, Lisa Gloria
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I like Transparent Oxide Red and Ultramarine Blue. Makes a rich warm transparent brown. Gorgeous rose!
I consider Raw Umber a cool brown and use it for graying flesh tones and things on the cool-light side. Even burnt Umber is a little too cool for me, tho’ warmer. I do use it for darkening a background…
I agree, they dry too soon.
My favorite warm underpainting color is Rembrandt’s Transparent Oxide Brown which is perfectly transparent, and great for glazing, later, too. It has a unique reddish-brown hue with great blendability, strong tinting strength without dominating or submitting to other colors when mixed, and can attain a deep low value (closer to black).
Caveat: it, too, dries very fast, so fast that the palette-dab you put out for dipping into is virtually unusable the next day. But, on the painting, that can be a good thing.
I agree with Cindy.. I use the Rembrandt Transparent Oxide Red and either WN ultramarine, or Rembrandt’s ultramarine….this is the combo I almost always use to sketch out the initial block in and can also make a rich deep brown.. cooler or warmer depending on the percentage of the Oxide Red vs. the Ultramarine in the mix.
I have also used alizarin crimson and sap green, but it’s a little trickier to handle, and has lower tinting strength.
Beautiful, beautiful rose!
Iwas going to suggest “Dave Darrow Brown” but he beat me to it!
I had never used Rembrandt’s Transparent Oxide Brown (or orange or red) until introduced to them by Dave! Now I don’t know how I painted without them! Alizarin crimson and sap green works for me too!
Good luck with your umber withdrawal!
I’m with you: sap green + alizarin crimson, with a touch of ultrmarine when I want it cool and really dark!
I agree totally!! I am mainly a portrait artist and find my faces have a lot of green and either alizarin crimson or alizarin purple, which work really well with skin tones.
Love all your comments, can relate to most of them, thank you for your blog!!
I’ll put in a vote for Williamsburg’s Dutch Brown Transparent (a transparent brown oxide) toned down with Pthalo Blue, a little for a more Burnt umber look or more for a Raw Umber. It’s a pretty nice brown pigment on it’s own too.
I hate umber for those exact reasons. I also don’t use black. I achieve my version of black by mixing burnt sienna and ultramarine blue. From there I can add more sienna to warm things up or more blue to cool it down. For me, it’s the perfect recipe.