Cobra Water-Mixable Oil Painting Mediums allow traditional oil painting techniques using Cobra Water Mixable Oil Colour. Cobra Mediums improve paint flow, thin colours, increase paint volume for impasto techniques, increase elasticity for durability of the paint film, control fat content for layering, and control transparency for glazing.
Cobra Artist Water Mixable Oil Colour
New to Jackson’s- the mediums you need to get the most from Cobra oil colours: painting medium, paste medium and glazing medium. Oil painting but no solvents required!
If you paint your oil painting in layers then you need to be aware of the ‘fat over lean’ principle when building your surface if you wish to create a durable structure.
When using water-mixable oil colours the same principle applies. The mediums can be used to increase the fat content of the paint as you build up your layers.
This video explains the process very well.
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Cobra Water-mixable Oil Painting Mediums and
Cobra Artist Water Mixable Oil Colour
on the Jackson’s Art Supplies website.
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23 thoughts on “Cobra Water-Mixable Oil Painting Mediums”
I would like to know if you advice to put
a first preparation layer of white painting
before starting to paint.
Dear Géraldine
It is up to you if you wish to prime your surface with white primer before you paint. However this is something that is often done because it allows colours with any degree of transparency to appear brighter. Priming your surface will also prevent the paint from sinking in to the substrate, and will protect natural surfaces such as cotton, linen or wood, from the oil, which can cause rotting over time when it is absorbed by such materials.
With many thanks
Lisa
please where in South Africa can I buy the
Cobra water mixable oils and medium
Hi Anneke
We ship to South Africa. You can buy from jacksonsart.com and if you click in the upper left of the page you can change the currency and see the prices in rand.
I heard there are already 50% water in
cobra painting medium, then what is the
maximum addition water can be added?
Is there 50% water percentage exist in
quick dry and paste medium as well?
Hi Tu Tu
The Cobra Painting Medium is indeed 50% water, so it is lean (like adding turps to a conventional oil medium). The Glazing Medium is the same as the Painting Medium but without any water, so it is fatter and suited for top layers of a painting. The mediums are designed to be fatter or leaner to allow adherence to the fat over lean rule. You can add water to all of them to adjust their fat if you are painting many layers, so each layer has more fat.
You can add as much water as you want to control the amount of fat and lean. Some artists who paint ala prima, so don’t need to worry about fat over lean, add a bit of the painting medium to a bucket of water just to add a bit of fat to their solvent (water is the solvent for these paints).
I do not know about the water content of the Quick Drying Medium or Paste and I couldn’t find anything online. I have emailed Royal Talens and will get back to you when they respond.
This video talks about the Cobra mediums and about adding water to them. It’s a good video.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pMz5vuG0FhI
Sam question regards quick dry
medium and painting paste oil ratio.
Have you get any update?
Also will propylene glycol be used as
a thinner instead of water?
Hi Lucy
I have been emailing with the Cobra team and found out that their video that says the painting medium contains water is out of date.
None of their mediums contain water now. They changed the formula a couple of years ago.
They said that they will not disclose exact oil percentages of their mediums.
But they said the painting medium, glazing medium and quick dry all contain 30-50% fat. They said that the Glazing Medium is the fattest, so I guess that means it is the 50%. They said that the Painting Medium and Quick Dry are the same, so I guess that means they contain 30%.
I wrote later to ask about the Painting Paste and they said it contains 30-50% oil. So perhaps they meant to include the paste in the first email as well in which case we don’t know for sure the percentages of the 3 that aren’t the Glazing Medium, just that they are 30-49% oil and Painting Medium and Quick Dry are the same.
They said they do not use Propylene Glycol.
Had any updates for oil content in quick dry medium?
Also, if the painting medium, contains water, why when I
shake it, it not turns milky. As we know water presence
will form milky emulsion. So I doubt there is water
inside
Hi Liz
I have been emailing with the Cobra team and found out that their video that says the painting medium contains water is out of date.
None of their mediums contain water now. They changed the formula a couple of years ago.
They said that they will not disclose exact oil percentages of their mediums.
But they said the painting medium, glazing medium and quick dry all contain 30-50% fat. They said that the Glazing Medium is the fattest, so I guess that means it is the 50%. They said that the Painting Medium and Quick Dry are the same, so I guess that means they contain 30%.
I wrote later to ask about the Painting Paste and they said it contains 30-50% oil. So perhaps they meant to include the paste in the first email as well in which case we don’t know for sure the percentages of the 3 that aren’t the Glazing Medium, just that they are 30-49% oil and Painting Medium and Quick Dry are the same.
I hope that is helpful.
Hi Julie,
All these medium saying
vegetable oils, does it imply
it is a mixture of different
oils like linseed, safflower,
poppy etc? If so, it may
create a chaos as such a
mixed blending:(
Like most other paint makers, Cobra don’t want to disclose their formula.
If it were a mixture of the drying oils it wouldn’t cause any problems.
Though most likely it is linseed oil as that is the most common oil and it dries the most flexible and strong.
Hi, I know for 087 painting
paste is designed for
impasto in direct painting
methods, but I want to ask
will it be safe to use this for
creating a more transparent
paint for under layers?
Which requires this be no
fatter than paint and
contains no complex
chemistry. May you help to
confirm with Talens and
advice? Thanks
Hi Nancy
I have emailed Talens to ask
Can Cobra Impasto Medium be used for the lower layers of a painting, using lots of medium to make the paint transparent? Is it lean enough for this or is it too fat to use this way? Is it more lean than oil paint itself, or the same, or fatter than oil paint?
I will get back to you when they answer.
Hi Tu Tu
I have been emailing with the Cobra team and found out that their video is out of date.
None of their mediums contain water now. They changed the formula a couple of years ago.
Thanks, then the out of date info indeed
makes things more confused. Then this
formula seems a very high percentage of
resin, like more than 50%? I think it is
common sense that too much resin will make
it too slippery for layered techniques and even
more harmful during varnishing/restoring, as
resins are reversible under solvents! It just
sounds like a crazy formula, isn’t it?
Yes, it is frustrating when materials are proprietary formulas but it would be so helpful to the artist to know what they are working with.
They are brilliant products and the company really care about making quality paint. But it would be helpful to know what’s in the mediums so we could use them properly.
I asked what they replaced the water with but didn’t get an answer. I asked if they used propylene glycol and they said no. A medium contains one or more of: a drying oil, solvent (which in this case is water), a resin, a drier, wax for body or to control the sheen. If they’ve left out the water maybe there is something else acting as a solvent?
I guess we’ll just have to go by how it performs. Let me know if you discover anything from using it over time.
yes Julie, it turns out too glossy
when I thinned it from 1:1 ratio, as
oil is no more than 50%, so 1:1 may
be max ratio of thinning. But it is
too glossy than if you thin oil. I
think it is because the rest is more
than 50%resin? The problem is too
glossy the surface beads up for
next layer, then finally have issues
with vanishing. Since their resin is
not count towards fats, so it is not
alkyd resin. it is difficult to use for
layered techniques. I have not seen
other manufacture use such
formula. It is different with Gamblin
solvent free, which is oil and alkyd
resin that is 100% fat.
Hi Julie,
Yeah, I also found it is too glossy of this
medium, suspect it is true that it contains
very high resin amount. Mine is also bead
up a lot. May you test as well for layering?
Hi Liz
I don’t think I will be doing tests for layering, at least not anytime soon.
I found in the testing I did for the more recent article Mediums are the Key – that it takes very little medium to modify the paint, I guess that’s why they come in fairly small jars. So maybe if you start off using as little medium as possible and then increase it you can avoid the beading up. And because you use so little medium the characteristics of the paint aren’t changed much so the characteristics of each brand are more evident. So you might want to try different brands.
I hope that helps.
Yes Julie, I use minimum
medium and also diluted to
use. It still very glossy and
beads up layers. So it really
seems it has too much resin
inside. I think due to the
high presence of resin, it
should be avoided for
layered painting. So I hope if
you have time can test best
medium for layering will
greatly help the artist
community!
Hi,
Your description for the fast drying says it
makes the paint fatter. This seems weird to
me, wouldnt a fast drying medium be more
useful under a normal drying fatter layer? So
wondering if this is correct? Basically want
to know which is fatter the fast drying
medium or the painting medium.
Also, with the winsor and Newton it’s
suggested to just use the thinner to dilute
paints because too much water makes it
quite tacky. Do cobra not have this problem,
as on the video the Dutch artist just uses
varying amounts of water and medium to
change fat?
Hi Liz
Any medium that contains any amount of oil that you then add to your oil paint, will add more oil to the paint than it contained before.
A lean medium might be 10 parts solvent (turps or in the case of water-mixable oils, water) to one part oil. But adding it to your oil paint still increases the oil content. So if you are painting in touch-dry layers, then starting with a lean medium and then for each layer adding more oil by using a fatter medium mixture until perhaps you are using neat oil for the final layer, allows you to be sure that each layer is fatter than the previous.
If the fast-drying medium contains any oil it will be adding oil to the paint and making it fatter. Remember that the solvent (turps or water) will evaporate and what remains is the extra oil you have added to the original paint. The tube of paint contains a ratio of oil to pigment and you have diluted the pigment with more oil each time you use a medium that contains oil.
Since you are interested in water-mixable oil paint you might find these articles useful:
WATER-MIXABLE OILS: VIBRANT COLOURS, EASY-CLEANUP AND THEY NEEDN’T BE STICKY
MEDIUMS ARE THE KEY TO WATER-MIXABLE OIL PAINTS
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