Walk into any art store and you're met with a dizzying wall of paint tubes. Check out a brochure and you see even more nuances. It’s great to have such a wide choice but, luckily - for your wallet - you don’t need to buy them all to make great art!

Still… how do you know which paint tubes are worth your money and how can you make a smart selection that will allow you to paint anything you want.

Today we’ll break down how to simplify your palette—without sacrificing nuance or flexibility.

Do You Really Need All These Tubes of Paint?

1. Classical vs. Modern Palettes

The classical atelier approach favors control over chaos. Instead of relying on convenience colors (pre-mixed purples, peach tones, grass greens, pre-mixed skin colors), it’s about learning how to mix what you need.

The old masters often worked with a surprisingly limited set of pigments—many of which were earth tones or natural mineral-based. No so surprising when you think that these limitations were due to availability. We’re spoiled with thousands of colors nowadays, thanks to modern chemistry but it wasn’t always like that. Yet, the old masters painted really well with a relatively limited selection. That limitation forced discipline.

Modern palettes offer vibrancy and intensity—but with great power comes great risk. Piling up tubes can easily lead to discordant color, muddy mixtures, or just plain overwhelm.

Simplification, when done right, isn’t a limitation. It’s a training method. It helps you understand the logic of color.

2. Simplify First, Expand Later

If you’re still getting comfortable with mixing, starting simple is the best way to develop consistency and control. Here’s an extremely reduced, yet functional classical skin tones palette to begin with:

Titanium White
Transparent Red Oxide
Ultramarine Blue

This portrait was done with only three colors: titanium white, ultramarine blue, transparent iron oxide

This limited set allows you to create surprising realism—especially in portraiture and figure work. You’ll be forced to solve color problems with subtle temperature shifts, clean mixing, and value precision. Try painting some figure studies or portraits with these, you’ll see that it’s surprisingly good.

Once the main principles are ingrained, you can expand. But when you do, add colors strategically—not just because they look pretty in the tube.

3. Don't Overcrowd Your Palette, but don’t Limit Yourself Either

The balance between minimalism and potential is crucial for your paint tube selection.

A painter is like a musician who would need to create their own notes before playing an instrument. How many keys do you want on your piano? Think about it well, because if you don’t have enough, it will some songs unplayable and if you have too many, your piano will be too large and impractical to play with.

Same thing for painters: too few colors can actually be counterproductive if it causes you to fight mixtures for too long or if your color range becomes so restricted that all your paintings start looking the same.

Likewise, having too many tubes can clutter your mixing decisions, dilute harmony, and lead to endless indecision.

The goal isn’t to hoard or to starve—it’s to curate. Build a palette that’s tailored to your subjects, your painting style, and your learning stage. An ideal selection of paint tubes should have a well-spread range that allows you to mix all the colors around the color wheel.

It should offer enough possibilities to explore subtle harmonies and surprising color interactions, but not so much that you're outsourcing all decision-making to the tube.

4. My Recommended Practical Palette

After years of trial and error, both in my own work and teaching others, here’s the palette I recommend. It strikes a useful balance between the limited palettes of classical training and the vibrancy offered by modern pigments.

More importantly, it allows me to go around the full 360° of the color wheel without gaps.

🎨 Florent’s Practical Palette

Titanium White (PW6)
Flake White (PW1) or a modern substitute — great for warm transparency and texture
Cadmium Yellow Light (PY35) — clean, cool, and strong
Yellow Ochre (PY42) — warm, earthy, excellent for skin and light mixtures
Raw Umber (PBr7) — fast-drying, cool brown, great for values and structure
Transparent Red Oxide (PR101) — a rich, warm glaze or shadow color
Burnt Umber (PBr7) — warm and dark, useful for pushing temperature
Venetian Red (PR101) — strong, earthy red with classical feel
Pyrrole Red (PR254) — a vibrant, clean warm red
Quinacridone Rose (PV19) — powerful, cool red for mixing purples or vivid accents
Ultramarine Blue (PB29) — essential for depth, shadow, and cool contrast
Ivory Black (PBk9) — for subtle neutral tones or muted blues when mixed
Cobalt Teal Blue (Turquoise Light) (PG50) — brilliant edge and atmosphere color
Phthalo Turquoise (PB15 + PG7) — very strong, best used with control
Phthalo Green Yellow Shade (PG36) — a tinting powerhouse, great for mixing nuanced greens

Of course, you don’t have to use them all, all the time. This list is just a suggestion. Feel free to choose your own pigments: before each painting, select the pigments that correspond to the range you plan for your composition.

This set allows for both subtle realism and striking expression, and works across a wide variety of subjects—from portraits to landscapes.

Final Thought: A Palette is a System, Not a Collection

Good painters don’t rely on color quantity—they rely on relationships. With the right palette, you gain not only the ability to reproduce color accurately but also to control the emotional tone of your work.

Don’t let marketing or aesthetics pressure you into owning every color on the shelf. Learn to do more with less—but never be afraid to expand when it serves your vision.