Are artist's oils a good medium for hand coloring B&Ws? I just purchased a small set of Marshall's photo oils and find that it is somewhat thick/dense, although the color is transparent. Would someone suggest various products they've had success with? How about oil sticks/crayons? Thanks.

-- Zoe (sagewolf@mindspring.com), August 18, 1999

Answers

Hi Zoe! The best thing to do with Marshall's Oils is to thin them using a palette and a little PM solution. Make sure your are suing fiber based paper or at least an RC paper with tooth like Kodak Art Max paper. Yes you can use pencils but I would stick to pastel pencils and not mix the two mediums.

-- Hap (Hap2gonospam@aol.com), August 18, 1999.

I use both Marshall photo oil paints and pencils. The oils are great for broad areas, and the use of PM will certainly tone them down, while pencils work well for finer details. I find that matte fiber based papers work best, though glossy papers work with preparation.

-- Chad Jarvis (cjarvis@nas.edu), August 19, 1999.