Here I'll discuss some things to be aware of when buying paints and choosing colors.

PERMANENCE, or, "WHERE DID THE COLOR GO?!"

There are two terms that describe the permanence of a color.

• Lightfastness refers to the color's resistance to fading and color change when exposed to strong light for a specific period of time.
• Fugitive refers to colors that fade or change in a very short period of time when exposed to light.

In 1984, The American Society for Testing and Materials, or ASTM, established worldwide pigment ratings. These Lightfastness ratings are as follows:

• ASTM I - Excellent Lightfastness
• ASTM II - Very Good Lightfastness
• ASTM III - Poor Lightfastness

This is generally how you will see the piments labeled. Some will designate Lightfatness with Arabic numbers: 1 (Excellent), 2 (Very Good) and 3 (Poor). At any rate, if you don't find a Lightfast rating on the brand of paint you're considering purchasing, don't buy it. All "Artist's Grade" or "Professional Grade" lines of paint will have a Lightfast rating. These are the higher end of the product line offered my most manufacturers. The lower end being "Student Grade" (full of fillers in order to keep the cost down). Most craft-style paints will not have a rating, and should be avoided, anyway, as they are intended for craft items that aren't expected to last.

Some colors that are not considered permanent are the "chrome colors", named for the lead chromate from which they are made. Chrome colors darken quickly and are toxic. However, most chrome colors have an acceptable match in other colors. For example, cadmium yellow and cadmium orange can be substituted for chrome yellow and chrome orange, respectively.

Organic colors made from vegetable or animal matter are also not permanent. Carmines and alizarin crimson are some examples. Some manufacturers of fine, artist's grade paints have formulated stable and/or non-toxic substitutes. You will know these "reformulated" paints by their lightfastness rating printed on the container; ASTM I or ASTM II. A word of caution is in order, though; some of these new, stable colors, while closely matching the colors they replace, will yield different results than expected when used in mixes. I'll illustrate and explain this further later in this discussion.

As I mentioned earlier, alizarin crimson is not a lightfast pigment. It is a fugitive color with an ASTM III rating. The folks at Chroma, Inc. (the manufacturers of the JoSonja brand) formulated a pigment they call "Permanent Alizarin", which is rated ASTM I. I can see no significant value difference compared to the "genuine" alizarin. It also passed my "mix test" with no unexpected results.

Always buy the best paints you can find, with a rating of ASTM I or ASTM II. Avoid brands that are not labeled with an ASTM rating; they are most likely not artist's quality. Again, do not purchase paints labeled as student grade. They are "learner" paints and are not meant to stand the test of time. Student grade paints are full of fillers to make them more affordable. Filler is also used as a cost effective way to makepaint opaque. Low quality paints usually will not yield clean mixes; they have a tendency to "muddy up".The best way to formulate opaque colors is with high pigment loads. This is why the Professional or Artist Grade lines cost more...pigments are expensive.

Lastly, steer clear of paints that don't list the pigment content on the container - another sign of an inferior paint. (See my discussion on the "Color Index Name", or C.I.N. See "What Is the Color Index Name?" for an explanation about pigment content).

"HUE" AND YOU'LL CRY

Be wary of paints that contain the word "hue" in their name. Do not confuse this with the technical art term "hue", which refers to pure color, such as red, green, yellow, etc. Used in the context of this column, "hue" is the term required by the ASTM when the paint does not contain the ingredient implied in the name - Cobalt Blue Hue, for example, does not contain cobalt. These colors are produced with a substitute chemical that is either less costly than the original, and/or less toxic. These paints closely match the originals straight out of the tube. However, I rarely use straight tube colors and find that when mixed with certain colors, these subsitutes don't yeild the result I'm expecting.

If your color mixing instructions do not specifically call for the "hue" versions, use the genuine color.

On the next page are examples of some "genuine" colors and their "hue" counterparts painted next to each other for comparison. I've also mixed a violet using both the reformulated and the genuine pigments to illustrate the different results obtained. Chances are, if you couldn't achieve a match to a color following mixing instructions, you've probably used a "hue" pigment. This is the voice of experience talking here. I had a HUGE puddle of paint after adding "a little bit of this and a little more of that" trying to mix a certain violet. Then that teeny little voice started telling me to review my pigments. I just happened to have a small amount of the "genuine" left in a tube. (I purchased a "hue" paint because my art store was out of the brand I normally use, and after all, cobalt blue is cobalt blue, right?). I used the genuine cobalt in a new mix and...perfect match, lesson learned. I could have painted a BARN with that first unfortunate pile of paint. This is why I will generally avoid reformulated pigments, with the exception of ASTM III rated colors. The extra cost is worth it to me for the predictable results.