Jack Richeson37-Ml Artist Casein Colors, Set of 12

As an artist I am always exploring new mediums. This is the first time I have used casein paints and I love them! They are the perfect paints to use for plein air - They are water based which means they dry quickly, which works well when trying to capture a scene outdoors. The texture is velvety - somewhat like egg tempera without the hassle of mixing the egg medium to the paints. I prefer the look and feeling of casein more than acrylic. I highly recommend trying them out!

This paint works as Casein paint should because the casein medium is so robust.It is opaque, dries quickly and goes on smoothly when diluted with water.Most of the colors are good, but some are mislabeled and all are poorly labeled. That may not be a problem for a casual hobbyist, but professionals and serious students understand the importance of proper labeling.For instance, what Shiva calls "light red" is actually terra-cotta; an earth pigment color that looks exactly like red-orange clay pots. It is nothing at all like a cadmium red light, which is what we expect when seeing the title "light-Red."Just as Winsor Newton likes to call certain colors "winsor" (i.e. Winsor blue, Winsor yellow) Shiva has adopted the same misleading policy. I note than in all cases, companies who use this misleading nomenclature choose the most brilliant colors like the Phthalocyanines. In the case of Winsor Newton, I suspect that they intentionally chose those names for the powerful pthalo pigments to lure uninformed amateur artists into believing only THEIR company had access to these potent pigments.In Shiva's case, It may simply be that the people there don't know what the heck they are talking about or don't know what information is crucial to professional artists. Maybe they know their pigments are cheap and do not which to divulge those facts. Maybe they are only concerned with selling a bunch of paint to amateurs and do not care about the needs of professional artists.Artists MUST know what pigments are used in each paint. Ideally, each color should be made with only one or two pigments so that the artist can effectively mix colors. Whenever manufacturers premix paint and give them romantic names, we can be certain they are NOT using the best quality pigments.After all, if you were making something (say, food) and you used only quality ingredients, you would want the customer to know!Whereas, if you are an inherently EVIL company trying to rule the world through patents on food, invasive propagation and litigious screwing of small family farmers, you would bribe congressmen to pass special laws that exempt your company from all crimes, and then bribe the so called "news" media to never report it. (We saw what you did there Monsanto!)In the same way food companies hide information or grudgingly offer it in print too small to read, paint manufacturers simply do not say what pigments they use. That is a practice that all artist's paint companies should cease forever.Having explained that, you can understand why I take exception to them calling primary-magenta "rose red."They have two versions of yellow ochre, one slightly darker than the other. The light yellow ochre they call "golden ochre." Why not just call it "yellow ochre light?" ~or~ "Our regular ochre with some white added to make you believe you were getting something for free."If you ever wondered why some of YOUR color mixtures don't work like they are supposed to, THAT is one reason.Poor labeling, misleading names, romanticized names or branded-names only serve to confuse those who wish to learn painting, thereby causing thousands of frustrated artists to waste materials and question their ability. None of this will cause wars, famine or disease like Monsanto's practices, but I would at least hope that in the world of art we could find more consistent honesty amongst paint manufacturers.With all that in mind, I can still recommend this deal as one of the best I've seen for 12 tubes of pre-made casein colors.As stated, they work as they are supposed to and generally are OK.So long as you know:That their Shiva blue is really pthalo-blue,That their light red is NOT red but terra cotta,They they give you two versions of yellow ochreTheir light blue is a "hue" (meaning a mixture, not a single-pigment color)Their rose red is a primary magenta,AND you know how to adjust for all that misinformation with a thorough knowledge of color-theory......Then you can work with these.The box they come in is nice... finger-jointed and sturdy.They are made in the USA, in Wisconsin. That makes sense since that's a big dairy state and casein paint is nothing more than reduced milk protein with pigment added.When working with these, they don't smell too bad unless you try to re-activate them on your palette; In which case they emit an awful chemical odor that is like a mixture of ammonia and bleach together. Shiva (Richeson) seems to have put some kind of anti-microbial agent in the medium to prevent mold and I suspect it is THAT which smells.I doubt that there is actually bleach in the paint since (one) that would affect the color and (two) the combination of ammonia (necessary to process milk curd into casein) and bleach is deadly, and I am not very dead yet.So I doubt you need worry about toxic fumes, but be advised there IS a smell when you re-activate paint with water on your palette.If you are new to casein, try this set or one of the smaller ones like the color theory set.It is a shame there are so few producers of casein. Casein paint is SO wonderful to work with once you learn its idiosyncrasies. Assuming we had proper labeling, we could be sure that casein with good pigments will last a L O N G time, since they are among the oldest surviving paint mediums extant. That only makes it more shameful that Shiva (Richeson) does not use standard names and proper labeling.Serious artists make their own casein paint by boiling / reducing curds with ammonia. It is probably the hassle and smell of that process that took casein out of favor with professional artists in the 1950's when acrylic paints were invented. Old-fashioned casein also had a short shelf life. This new stuff has some chemical in it that prevent it from going bad too soon.You might also consider buying ONLY Shiva's casein medium, buying properly labeled pigments and mixing your own casein paints with them. Then you would be assured of having quality pigments AND you would be able to mix any color under the sun for MUCH less money and practically no effort.Bottom line? This set is a great deal for those new to the medium of casein. Most of the colors are decent. None of them are superb except the process-primaries (yellow and magenta, mislabeled light yellow and rose red) and of course the reliable pthalos, green and blue. Having two versions of yellow-ochre is unnecessary, as is having a pthalo green along with a pthalo blue.If you know color theory, then you will be able to cope with these unnecessary nuisances and still get good color mixtures without too much hassle. As it is, I spent two days testing, mixing and making color swatches trying to figure out what was wrong with these color-names. Now that I have those sorted out, I can use these paints effectively.Professionals must look elsewhere if they want archival quality, proper label information and reliable mixing.

After I ordered the Casein paints I noticed that the text stated 6 tubes, but the image showed 12. I actually never saw the text until they were ordered and tried to cancel thinking it would just be 6 tubes. Fortunately, it was 12 tubes for an excellent price and I look forward to putting the paint on canvas. Highly recommended !

Nice paint. I use it as a substitute for my oils until I can get ventilation in my studio

I am happy with the color selection and the wooden box is a bonus. Casein is a wonderful medium to paint in and I combine it with acrylic and acrylic gouach.

This set of twelve comes in a very nice wooden box, perfect for travel. This is a very good value and thepaints are of exceptional quality.

I was excited to get my casein paints in the mail. I was less excited when I opened them up and put them on my new white palette. Not only was the smell a little overpowering to me (it smelled like a cleaning solution), but when I painted, the phthalo's were absolutely overpowering and difficult to wash out.I'm very familiar with using phthalo colors, and I realize that it is a very intense and strong concentrated color typically. I regularly use gouache, and often I use oil paints. This one was different though. I could not, for the life of me, wash out the pthalo. All of my colors proceeded to have the blue in it, and my brushes were dyed a dark blue and my palette is forever stained. I spent a good 5-10 minutes on each brush with brush cleaner trying to get rid of the blue, and it's STILL coming out a week later. I had given a new palette to my friend to try out the paints and she had similar complaints. I'll attach the photo of the palette she used for one single session. Keep in mind, that we DO regularly use other phthalo blues in other mediums and I never had an issue like this before.Other than that, I think the paints are decent to use. They are a little thicker than gouache, and they look very similar to me and act almost the same. The feel of the paint is a step closer to oils, which I like, but I am going to stick with gouache, unless the phthalo blue was just a bad batch. It's just not worth the time and energy going into scrubbing everything afterward, and I feel a little uncomfortable painting with them in a closed environment since they are so strong smelling.

Nonostante l'errore nella spedizione per avermi inviato un altro oggetto tutto poi è andato a buon fine.Ottimo articolo lo consiglio!