Daniel Smith's goal is to make the painting process as memorable as your finished work. Daniel Smith have spent over eighteen years developing the finest and most complete line of watercolour paint so you can create your own unique vision. Today, just like in 1993, these watercolours are 'formulated to meet and exceed the highest industry standards for the manufacture of artist’s paints', and every batch made is tested and analysed for its performance qualities.

Bold Basics Set the Stage for Brilliant Results
The key to a successful palette starts with high-quality paint in primary tones. Beginners to the most advanced painters benefit from a selection of warm and cool primaries for colour mixing.

To make a fiery orange, try mixing New Gamboge (a warm yellow) with Pyrrol Scarlet (a warm red). Cool yellows (like Lemon Yellow) are slightly green and are useful for creating vibrant green shades.

These primary colours and their clean mixtures can be neutralized or brightened to suit your subject. Remember to add earth tones to complete your basic palette.

Secondary Colours Add Balance and Harmony to Your Work
Expand your palette with violets, greens and oranges. These colours, situated between the primaries on your palette, allow for complex and harmonious colour relationships.

Some secondary colours are pre-mixed watercolours that are best bought by the tube because they are used so frequently (Sap Green is an example of a popular pre-mixed shade).Others are single pigment paints, like Quinacridone Burnt Orange, that add a serious pop to your palette but cannot be mixed using primary colours.

The PrimaTek colours are made with genuine minerals, finely ground into pigments. Many are semi-precious minerals, such as amethyst, hematite and lapis lazuli.

The Luminescent range contains four different types. Iridescent colours reflect light like a mirror while Interference colours refract and scatter the light. Duochrome paints bounce between two colours depending on the light source, and Pearlescent colours add an opalescent shine.

Daniel Smith’s products are not tested on animals. The only animal-derived ingredient is the pigment PBk 9. PBk 9 is found in the following watercolours only: Sepia, Ivory Black, Joseph Z’s Neutral Grey and Payne's Gray.

Read more about Daniel Smith Primatek colours on our blog.