A Wet Pallette

Yes it may sound rather kinky! But a wet palette could be the one of the greatest inventions ever!!!!

I had until a few years ago never heard of a wet palette until reading a very good post on the Flames of War forum. I'm not sure if you can access the Battlefront forum if you have not registered but this is the link to the relevant article Gallery-for the love of painting (Panzer IV platoon); if you are not a member of the forum I would strongly recommend joining, its full of great ideas, eye candy etc.. Anyway buried in the post is a 'how to' make a wet palette. Great idea I thought must do that, so a couple of years later still had not got round to it.

Then when looking for inspiration on a completely different subject I came across this site and an article on how to make a wet palette; Flory Models. This was about a week ago by the way. So this time I had a rummage round the house and made myself a wet palette;

 So take one sealable tupperware type container;

Then add one sponge cloth;

Pack of four from a well known high street trader. Okay it was Sainsburys and I think they were £1.50 for the pack. Cut to required size;

Soak the sponge cloth under the tap and squeeze out the excess water, place in base of receptacle. Then cut out  a piece of grease proof paper;

Following the instructions from the Flory's site I boiled the kettle let it cool for a couple of minutes then soaked the paper in the hot water. Then removed the paper from the water and carefully folded it to drain off any excess. Then placed the wet paper on top of the cloth and sealed the container.

As you can see I have used the wet palette, the paint inside has been there for about four days now and is still pliable. This is my usual palette;

More and more I'm using Vallejo paints these days and though its great to be able to put a few drops on the palette, it drys quickly (unless you use a flow enhancer or medium to prolong the paint life out of the pot). So now with the wet palette, I should have less waste and especially if mixing paints the same colour combination should  last a while.

In all it took about ten minutes to make and all I had to buy were the cloth sponges, and this nifty little gadget could potentially save me money on paints.