Another Daniel Smith 5ml set - Alvaro Castagnet.

Another Daniel Smith 5ml set has recently been released, including a new colour - Burnt Sienna Light. Here's the link 

I am always fascinated by the different colours artists choose, and have painted out many palette choices in my sketchbook from the wonderful artist dot cards that Daniel Smith have produced.

Alvaro paints with passion and adores reds. The interesting thing for me is that this set doesn't include a 'warm and cool' of each colour but rather a 'warm and neutral' of each colour. Hansa Yellow Deep is a warm yellow, Yellow Ochre as a great neutralised warm yellow. Mayan Orange as a warm orange-red, Burnt Sienna Light as the neutralised orange. Pyrrol Red is a bright red, Deep scarlet is a neutralised warm red.

Then there is the lovely pair of a mid and a warm blue - Cobalt Blue and Ultramarine Blue. Neutral Tint and Viridian (a granulating and liftable pigment similar in hue to phthalo green) complete the set of 10 colours. There are no cool yellows, reds or even blues.

The new colour, Burnt Sienna Light, is made from PR101 + P048 so provides a more orange and less earthy burnt sienna hue than the regular Burnt Sienna PBr7. I imagine it will be particularly welcome for those switching to Daniel Smith from other brands.

I had a bit of a play when I first heard about the new colour (new colours are such fun!) mixing Quinacridone Burnt Orange and Transparent Red Oxide to create what I expected would be the new colour. (see the top row) I love the wild granulation of Transparent Red Oxide (top right) PR101.

I then added the W&N Burnt Sienna PR101, then below left is the regular Burnt Sienna PBr7 that I love.

The new Burnt Sienna Light arrived today and is shown below right. It is nicely granulating. I'll play with it some more soon :-)

Some of the colours are only available in 5ml tubes if you buy this set, though you can still get them in 15ml tubes. Burnt Sienna Light is exclusive to this set but I hope to see it extended in to the 15ml range.

Mixing with Burnt Sienna options

Burnt Sienna mixed with most of my Ultimate Mixing Palette colours.

I have created a post about mixing with Daniel Smith Burnt Sienna PBr7, as part of a series on mixing my Ultimate Mixing Palette colours, which can be found here.

Burnt Sienna is one of my favourite basic palette colours. Here I'll show some of the other mixing options I explored.

The first shows Burnt Sienna mixed with a basic pair of yellows, reds and blues. Here I was still experimenting with a custom mixed magenta but I switched to Quinacridone Rose as a more useful basic cool red.

Burnt Sienna mixed with possible palette options, Moleskine watercolour sketchbook A5

I like Burnt Umber but it isn't as useful as a mixing colour as Burnt Sienna. I include it in my palette as a convenient warm brown even though it is easily mixed as you can see above - just a little Ultramarine mixed with Burnt Sienna creates a burnt umber hue. Here it is mixed with other possible palette colours.

Burnt Umber mixed with different palette colour options. Moleskine watercolour sketchbook, A5.

Here is the gorgeous Transparent Red Oxide mixed with other possible palette colours. It is slightly more orange than Burnt Sienna and can be wildly granulating, which I really love, but Burnt Sienna is a more useful basic palette colour as granulation is not always required. Another interesting Burnt Sienna option is the W&N PR101 Burnt Sienna, which is very much a burnt orange colour, but without the granulation you can see here.

Transparent Red Oxide mixed with possible palette colours. Moleskine watercolour sketchbook, A5

2 - Mixing with Burnt Sienna

Part 2 of a series of posts about mixing with my Ultimate Mixing Palette colours. 

Burnt Sienna comes in a huge range of hues. I have posted about many of them here and more can be seen on my website in the Painted Watercolour swatches section here. 

Burnt Sienna is a neutralised orange. It is a wonderful colour to have in your palette as a mixing colour. It speeds up the creation of other colours, especially grey mixes with blues, as you would otherwise have to mix a yellow and a red and then to blue to create a grey. Even in a very limited palette of a single red, yellow and blue, Burnt Sienna is an excellent 4th colour addition.

While Burnt Sienna is available in a options from a burnt orange to a burnt umber hue and is made from a range of pigments and pigment mixes, I prefer the earthy PBr7 Burnt Sienna (Daniel Smith, though Da Vinci and M.Graham are very similar in colour) as I find it useful as a convenient skin colour when washed out with lots of water as well as being a great earthy warm brown in landscape work. It is also the perfect mixing partner with Ultramarine to make my Jane's Grey - a convenient dark shadow colour that also acts as a neutral tint for the other colours, without introducing a deadening black pigment. To see some of the alternative pigments I tried, have a look here.

Here is Daniel Smith Burnt Sienna mixed with 13 of my Ultimate Mixing Palette colours. It creates yellow ochre and raw sienna hues with the yellows, burnt scarlet and brown madder hues with the reds, wonderful greys and deep blues and browns with the blues and a range of other browns with Raw Umber and Goethite. With Phthalo Green it creates lovely pine greens and with Buff titanium create flesh-tones. 

To see more mixing charts with these and many more colours see the Watercolour Mixing Charts tab on my website. These charts are also available in book or eBook form.

For the full range of colour mixes that can be created with my Ultimate Mixing Set of colours, see my book The Ultimate Mixing Palette; a World of colours. Both books are available through blurb.com as physical or eBooks here.

Ultramarine, Mid yellow and Magenta - a gorgeous basic bright triad with Ultramarine.

I wrote a post about this set here in May 2013. I wanted to have another look at them, so here is the amazing range you can get with Ultramarine Finest Schmincke PB29, Purple Magenta PR122 Schmincke and Hansa Yellow Medium PY97 Daniel Smith, though Schmincke Pure Yellow would do the same thing. Or if using W&N, Winsor Yellow, the more granulating French Ultramarine and Quinacridone Magenta.

If you want to add a 4th to create neutral browns and greys more quickly, add an orange - a bright orange as seen here or a Burnt Sienna as seen here. 

Other Burnt Sienna options are shown here

This is an alternative to the beautiful bright quartet using Phthalo Blue Red Shade shown here.

Alternative primary red options are the more crimson W&N Permanent Alizarin, DS Carmine or DV Permanent Alizarin Quinacridone. I prefer the more crimson primary reds, since I don't see a lot of 'magenta' out in the real world - more pinks and crimsons, but nothing I have used mixes cleaner than PR122. Another excellent primary red is a PV19 Quinacridone Rose (or Permanent Rose). It will also mix clean purples and oranges. It is slightly less powerful than the magenta, but more lightfast and is a basic colour in my palette.

Watercolour Comparisons 4 - Burnt Sienna

Burnt Sienna is one of the most useful colours in the palette. Whether you are using a limited palette with one of each of the primaries or a split palette with a warm and a cool of each of the primaries, Burnt Sienna is fabulous addition. You can see all these swatches, along with other earth colours, on my website here.

It is possible to mix a burnt sienna hue using a yellow and a red to make an orange, then adding ultramarine to create a neutralised warm brown. But it is much quicker to use a single pigment paint.

There are a number of options. Burnt Sienna should be made from PBr7 - a natural earth pigment that is also used to make Burnt Umber, Raw Umber and Raw Sienna. Heating the Raw Sienna pigment creates the burnt Sienna. Some companies use PR101, (which is also used to make Indian and Venetian reds) to make a Burnt Sienna Hue.

My preference is for the earthy look of PBr7. Mixed with Ultramarine it creates a warm Indigo, burnt umber hues, lovely greys, stormy sky colours, shadow colours and so on. With a yellow it creates raw sienna hues. With a phthalo blue it creates cool greys and browns. With a crimson it creates earthy indian reds and burnt reds...and so on. Alone, just mixed with water, it creates a perfect skin tone.

So which is the best? That depends what you like to paint, whether you like granulation or not, whether you want a more orange colour or a more neutral burnt orange colour.

 Burnt Sienna Options - Top line: Burnt Sienna M.Graham PBr7, Burnt Sienna Old Holland PBr7, Burnt Sienna Rembrandt PBr7, Burnt Sienna Hue Art Spectrum PR101, Transparent Mars Brown Mameri Blu PR101, Burnt Sienna Winsor & Newton PR101, Quinacridone Burnt Orange Daniel Smith PO48
Bottom line: Hemetite Burnt Scarlet Daniel Smith Genuine Hematite, Transparent Red Oxide Daniel Smith PR101, Enviro-Friendly Red Iron Oxide Daniel Smith PBr6, Burnt Sienna Daniel Smith PBr7, Burnt Sienna DaVinci PBr7, Italian Burnt Sienna Daniel Smith PBr7.

It is clear the options range from an orange through to more red-based browns with more or less granulation. Transparent Red Oxide provides a wonderfully granulating version with a definite orange hue, Hematite Burnt Scarlet is also highly granulating with wonderful colour range. Quinacridone Burnt Orange goes all the way to the orange side so will not neutralise so well, but is quite a popular option for those who don't like granulation, as is the W&N Burnt Sienna (hue).

One of the best tests though is how the colour works with Ultramarine and other blues. Here is a range of colours possible with Burnt Sienna mixed with Ultramarine, Phthalo Blue and Cerulean - classic blues in the palette. It is the deep greys and browns and blues that I am looking for with Burnt Sienna. Notice how lovely and granulating the Art Spectrum Burnt Sienna Genuine is. I loved this colour but it didn't re-wet as well in the palette as the Daniel Smith and Da Vinci so was superseded. Also notice that Burnt Umber (hue) is readily mixed by adding Ultramarine to Burnt Sienna so is not necessary in a limited palette.

Burnt Sienna mixed with blues - Ultramarine, Phthalo Blue, Cerulean.

 Here is Burnt Sienna with Cerulean. Note that Burnt Sienna creates wonderful greys with Cerulean but with that with Quinacridone Burnt Orange it makes greens rather than greys.

Burnt Sienna and Quinacridone Burnt Orange + Cerulean. 

You can see Burnt Sienna and Phthalo blue on the second line below. Since Phthalo blue is cooler than Ultramarine it will create cooler blues and greys, including creating a raw umber hue.

Phthalo Blue mixed with a range of brown pigments - Burnt Umber, Raw Umber, Burnt Sienna, Indian Red, Raw Sienna and Burnt Umber.

My favourite is Daniel Smith for a rich earthy version, or Da Vinci for an equally rich earthy but slightly more orange version. Both of these are PBr7. I also love Transparent Red Oxide for special effects so have that as an extra when painting, as well as the DS Burnt Sienna that is always in my palette.

Happy painting!

Watercolour Comparisons 1 - Ultramarine Blue here
Watercolour Comparisons 2 - mid yellows here
Watercolour Comparisons 3 - Primary Red here
Watercolour Comparisons 4 - Burnt Sienna here
Watercolour Comparisons 5 - Greens (Single Pigment, convenience mixes and special effect) here
Watercolour Comparisons 6 - Reds (Cool, mid and warm) here
Watercolour Comparisons 7 - Yellows (cool mid and warm) here
Watercolour Comparisons 8 - Blues here

Travel palette in action

Coral sketch

Shell sketch

These sketches were done in the pocket sized Moleskine watercolour notebook I keep with me, using the limited colours in the travel palette  I posted about earlier. You can see the 'bistre' in the shadows - the combination of Burnt Sienna and Ultramarine, the Buff Titanium and Goethite in the sand and a hint of Quinacridone Gold.

Gorgeous Greys in Watercolour

To make a gorgeous series of useful greys without adding black, which will dull your painting, try mixing Burnt Sienna PBr7, a neutral orange-brown, with Ultramarine PB29, a warm blue. 

Burnt Sienna (left) mixed with Ultramarine Blue (right) with various amounts of water.

This will create an invaluable range of light greys, light blue greys for skies or water, deep browns, deep stormy greys as well as indigo and burnt umber hues. It is a useful mix for shadows and, with lots of water, for painting white objects in shadow.

Note that Ultramarine is a granulating pigment, so don’t expect smooth washes, but enjoy the granulation as the pigment settles into the paper.

Other options for creating blacks and gorgeous greys include Transparent Pyrrol Orange DS mixed with Phthalo Blue RS, and Phthalo Green mixed with Pyrrol Crimson DS, Anthraquinoid Red DS or most crimsons, and Ultramarine mixed with a bright Orange as seen here.

Burnt Sienna

Burnt Sienna, Daniel Smith watercolour.

Burnt Sienna is a wonderful natural orange- brown. Warm and versatile, this is an ancient pigment known as PBr 7 - i.e. a burnt or roasted version of Raw Sienna.

It varies considerably form one manufacturer to another. The Art Spectrum Natural Burnt Sienna is slightly more red and very granular - really wonderful for achieving a very granulated appearance. Schmincke make a browner version. Some manufacturers make it using mixes with Indian Red, PR101, an opaque red brown which is not the same thing at all, and really should be labelled as a hue. You have to read the label carefully so you get the characteristics you are expecting. I like this Daniel Smith version as it is a lovely neutral relatively transparent orange brown.


It is fantastic in mixes, and would be my number 4 colour in a limited palette. With Ultramarine it makes an amazing array of gorgeous greys, indigo, browns and deep blues. I'll post a chart of that combination later. You can also find it on my website.

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