CHAPTER VIII: OTHER TOOLS
It remains to speak of those tools which are not essentials, but
conveniences, to painting. Even as conveniences, however, they are of
importance enough to have influence on your work. You can paint with
them, but you will work more easily for the having of them; and
something of the sort, although not necessarily of the same kind, you
must have. You may improvise something, in other words, to take the
place of these, but you would be wiser to get those which are made for
the purpose.
The Box. - First, the box. You must keep your things together somehow, and it would
be as well that you keep them in a box which is portable and suited to the purpose. When
you sketch you must have a proper box, and why not have one which is equally
serviceable in-house? Those most commonly sold to amateurs are of tin, and they are
various in size and construction, and not too expensive. The only thing against them is
the difficulty of adapting them to service different from that they were designed for; that
is, if you want to put in a different sort of panel, or it you want to fix it in the cover for
convenience, or anything like that, you cannot readily do so, because you cannot use
tacks in them. This counts for more than would seem on a sketching trip. But the tin box
is light, and is not easily broken, and while it is in shape is practical.
The box to be most recommended is the wooden one. It costs more than the tin one, -
about twice as much; but you always arrange if for an emergency very readily, and if it
gets broken you can fix it yourself, or get any carpenter to do it for you, while you may be
a good many miles from a tinner, who would be necessary to mend your tin box.
You had better not get too large a box. Get one long enough for the brushes; but if you
are going to use it out-of-doors much, get a narrow one with a folding palette, so as to
save weight. In this way you will get a larger palette than you could get in a smaller and
wider box, which is an important consideration.
The Palette Knife. - Of more immediate necessity to your painting is the palette-
knife. You cannot keep palette clean without it. Now again and again you may want to
mix colors, or even paint with it. But you constantly get rid of the too much mixed color
on your palette with it, and this is essential to good painting. Take some care to select a
good knife; have the blade long enough to be springy and flexible, but not too long.
About five inches from the wood of the handle to the end of the blade is a good length.
And see that it bends in a true curve from one end to the other, and is not stiff at the end
and weak in the middle. It should have the same even elasticity that a brush should have.
For painting you need a “trowel palette-knife,” which has a bent shank, making the blade
and the handle on different levels, so that as you press the blade to the canvas, the