Battle of the Acrylic Mediums Part 2

In this test, I compared four mediums prepared according to the formula in part 1: one palette knife full of medium to two drops of Hansa Yellow paint. The Golden Glass Gel Bead Medium (try saying that five times fast) holds a mark well. It is nice and sparkly. It warps the canvas paper a little bit, but not badly. In prior testing, I found that you can get different effects by painting over dried glass bead medium, mixing paint with medium (as in this test), or putting glass bead medium over dried paint. My favorite effect is the last one mentioned because it's so sparkly. =-)

The matte gel (Liquitex) worked well, too. It's obviously not as thick as the Extra Heavy Gels, but you can goop it on pretty good. Color quality is a bit dull as you would expect with a matte surface.

On this same pageI also tested Extra Heavy Gels (Golden) in both Matte and Gel. Matte can be used to make encaustic-type effects (I learned this in a class I took back in June--see blog from then). The gloss version is very shiny/glossy, as its name suggests. Both Extra Heavies spread on nice and thick; they hold a mark well. I must admit I like the matte better because the gloss is too glassy for my taste. I understand you can mix them for a nice satin look.