The Grand Unboxing, Part 1!

Gouache are wonderful. They're like time-travelers. You squeeze them on a palette and they are creamy and soft and wonderful, and you use them and then put them away... upon which point they dry up into these chrysalises just waiting for revival into gloriousness with the application of water. I had literally left these paints on the palette for two years before starting on the Alysha covers earlier this month and boom! A little water and they were ready for action.

*hugs her gouache* You so noble, gouache. I lurv you.

Having said that, though, you cannot create something out of nothing... I seem to recall some science classes to that effect. So when I ran out of Payne's Gray working on the sky for Sword of the Alliance's cover, I went to the tubes to squeeze out some new paint.

...and it turns out that gouache does not survive very well in the tube. Like, at all. Two years between uncappings, and what rolled out of that tube was an outhouse smell that would have felled an ox. My eyes started watering.

("Ursula!" I said, because it's to Ursula I go whenever I need to cry about these things, "My paints have rotted!"

"Oh no! What was the binder on them?"

"Honey..."

"OH NO YOU HAVE FERMENTED MEAD RUN AWAAAAAY")

Anyway. My paints are the best paints I've ever tried--and I've tried a lot--by a manufacturer committed to utmost quality, which means they don't try to extend their lives artificially. The honey they use as binder makes them so creamy they are like working with butter. But it also means, apparently, that they ferment into mead if left alone long enough. I had no idea mead smelled so HORRIBLY when rotted, but I have been educated.

Which meant... new paint. Which I bought (with some help!). I also bought some extra brushes, and some more paper, and so we're going to get allllllll the unboxing this week.

...many many tiny compartments containing treasure.

Thirty-five tubes' worth of treasure...

Witness this dragon's hoard! Was any dragon ever so rich as this jaguar right now! Absolutely not, because these tubes are full of eye-punchingly vibrant, gorgeous colors, and they do NOT smell like fermented mead! *hugs them all*

Oh, and also... brushes!

...in the sizes I use most often, 4, 1, and 0. I should probably have gotten a 2, too. Next time.

These are the only brushes I like. I am so picky. They are made with Russian sable fur, which has become somewhat more difficult to find lately, so I keep buying spares and squirreling them away. I am really, really rough on my brushes. My painting technique requires a lot of nearly-dry-brushing, which means I fray the hairs far more quickly than if I was using them wet. But these brushes are unparalleled for the purposes I use them for. There's no comparison between what you can accomplish with a bad brush and what you can do with an excellent one.

That #4 was only $20! I was stoked. *dances*

Anyway. Having gotten all this fresh, delightful new paint, I couldn't possibly put it down on a palette with all the old dry stuff. So it was time for the grand washing.

...which quickly turned into the grand soaking, because after two years, a lot of them were clinging to the plastic with fanatic devotion. *hugs her paints* Thank you, paint! I know you are doing your best for me! You have labored long, but it's all right, you can now go to your just reward!

So here's where I stopped. Next step: more scrubbing. Then the unboxing of the paper (arriving soon!), and then we will put the new paint on and take the entire thing for a test drive! Together! <3

*patpats soaking palette*

*hugs all the paint*

*babies the new brushes and croons to them*