How to Select the Basic Color Palette for Soft Pastels 

Yes, I'm glad you love Richeson pastels! It's a nice brand with a great color range. I actually have a few Artists' sets with them, you can check them out on Dakota pastels.

Thanks so much for your wonderful comment Diane! And I'm so glad that you love my Waves course and my Richeson set! I hope you'll have your waves exhibited in Richeson gallery sometime. You'd be surprised to know that the Richeson's landscape show was one of the first shows I got accepted (I believe around 2012). We were living in Plover at that time, in WI for my husband's job. So it's very interesting that you mentioned that, a nice coincidence :) Happy painting! ❤️

Amazing Lana! Plover is 20 minutes from us - we are in Wisconsin Rapids. Next Tuesday I am pulling my granddaughter (who is a senior) out of school and we are going to a full-day pastel workshop at Richeson. I love that they offer classes and the cost includes the materials. That way people can try somethings before they decide if they would like to invest in all the supplies. I know that Charlie will love it and it will be a special time, as she is graduating early in just a couple months.@@LanaBallot

@@dianeoconnor1952 As they say, it's a small world! 😁 Have a great time painting with your granddaughter!

I'm glad my videos are helpful. I don't have a Patreon, sorry. I do have a few Zoom classes throughout the year and the Independent study courses in my online school.

You are welcome! I’m glad it was helpful.

You are welcome!

I’m so glad it is. I wanted to have a video like this so I can refer my potential students to it, particularly the beginners, and I thought it might be useful to others too.

You are welcome!

I hear you 😂 But it’s so hard to resist those gorgeous colors..

@@LanaBallot it’s true! You know how it is, Lana! ❤️

Glad it helped 😊

Glad you liked it ❤️

Thank you for sharing your experience with pastels! Yes, a lot of artists work from harder pastels to softer. That’s what I’m doing as well particularly on sanded paper. On non sanded paper, I find it’s best to start with softer brands right away. And since the beginners often use non sanded paper first, it might be easier for them to work on it with softer brands. It’s entirely up to them and depends on their budget as well (as harder brands are less expensive). Either way, they need to learn about color, how it works in pastels. That’s what I wanted to focus on here. We need both types of pastels - harder and softer. If beginner artists start with harder pastels they’ll add softer brands later, or the other way around. But I find that it’s essential to have a base selection of colors that will allow them to layer colors, to get enough variety to paint what they want. I also mentioned plein air in the video because the approach of selecting the colors is rather similar. It's very likely that artists who pack their pastels for going outdoors already have some experience with the medium, so they would have their own preferences in harder and softer brands that fit their style. And I absolutely agree, if someone loves detail and smoother color transitions, they would need to expand their palette to include more colors. Of course, in that case it would not be the base color palette. There’s so much to talk about when it comes to pastels and color. I feel like the hard and soft pastel brands would make a good topic for a separate video at some point. Thanks again for your input! I’m sure a lot of people will find your comment very helpful. ❤️

You are welcome!

I’m glad you liked it!

You are welcome! I’m glad it is 😊

Thank you Susan! I always have a paragraph about the basic palette in my Materials list to classes, but now I can refer my students to this video. So I've been thinking about making this video for some time 😁

@@LanaBallot great idea!

Thanks so much Dawn! I really appreciate it ❤️

Thank you for your recommendations, Pete! Yes, both Sennelier and Unison sets you mentioned are great to start with. It’s a good investment for those who are serious about the medium.

Yes, whatever works is fine. I have some plastic boxes too for storing extras. I did line them with spongy material too. Later I got the boxes for plein air really, it had to be attached to a tripod - it’s hard to invent something that works that well.

You are very welcome! I’m looking forward to meeting you in class!

Thank you Susie! I'll see if I can make a flower tutorial sometime, something that shows the basics more. Thanks for watching my videos!

Thank you Lana I shall look forward to this I just finished trying another flower picture and will keep trying to get better at this as there are so many beautiful flowers to appreciate

@@LanaBallothow exciting! I too look forward to your flower tutorial, as I love painting nature.

Thanks! A good suggestion 😊

Oh yes please! That would be very helpful!!

Thanks!