After I’d posted yesterday’s 30x30DirectWatercolor2018 painting, I realised that the third of the three scenes was mislabelled – it wasn’t a true “split complementary” palette as it included the yellow (directly opposite violet on the colour wheel) as well as the yellow orange and yellow green that are the complements. The yellow orange was also far too red so, after getting back to the books to read up more, I decided it was necessary to do another painting:

This is a more accurate palette, painted using the colours that were still out from yesterday. That said, once into the realm of actual painting rather than trying to complete an exercise, I think there is plenty of benefit (and fun) in working with any palette of two or three colours and exploiting the contrasts and harmonies between them. Picking colours purely due to theory can end up like painting by numbers or writing a songs that only use strict diatonic chords, straight rhythms and no accidentals. Books are just the starting point.