Re: Gum Tri-Color Yellow

Tom Ferguson wrote:
>
> I did receive my Daniel Smith Permanent Yellow #133, pigment PY110.
>
> That is definitely going to solve most of my problems (well, at least
> my tri-color gum problems). Not only us it a deeper pigment (more
> concentrated color), but I can put more of it in the mix without
> staining. You've got to love that! There is a reason Katharine likes
> this pigment!
>

Tom, I'm so glad you like the pigment. Yes, there's a reason I love it,
in fact there are two: I love it because its color is deep and rich,
and because it is highly transparent. My reason for loving it has
nothing to do with staining or lack thereof, as staining is simply never
an issue for me with any pigment.

I mix my pigments to full color saturation for the given pigment,
without exception, and at the risk of appearing egocentric I have to say
I don't understand why anyone would mix their pigments in any other way;
why would you not use the full potential of the pigment? That's why I
assumed, and assumed rightly, it seems to have turned out, that Tom, an
experienced gum printer, was using that other pigment to its full
potential and its full potential just wasn't good enough for the
purpose.

Sometimes I do want to print the color in a paler tint, and then I take
the stock mix and "water" it down with more gum, but for most purposes I
print with the mix at full color saturation. In my experience, pigment
stain occurs when the amount of pigment used exceeds the amount of
pigment necessary to reach full color saturation; in other words excess
pigment is used that cannot possibly add anything to the print and is
better done without. I think people sometimes believe that the more
pigment the better; this is definitely not the case.

At any rate, as I said the other day, how much pigment is the right
amount to achieve complete color saturation differs according to pigment
strength of the different pigments and according to brands. I've only
used PY110 in M. Graham, so I can't say how it compares to Daniel Smith,
although I will have the opportunity to make that comparison soon when
the last of my M. Graham runs out, as they no longer package that
particular pigment. But as packaged by M. Graham, I wouldn't say that
PY110 requires very much paint to achieve color saturation, in fact in
comparison to M. Graham's "azo yellow" (PY 151) the azo requires, as a
rough guess, 3X the pigment that PY110 requires to achieve color
saturation. But there's no stain in either case, as long as one doesn't
use more pigment than is necessary to achieve saturation. And again,
just so there's no misunderstanding, I'm talking about color saturation
for the particular pigment, I'm not talking about trying to make PY151
as dark as PY110, which of course could never happen, as the PY151 even
at total saturation is much lighter in value than the PY110.
Katharine
Received on Wed Jun 9 11:19:24 2004