What is Ox Gall & How to Use it in Watercolor!

What is Ox Gall & How to Use it in Watercolor! Ox gall is a wetting agent designed to increase the flow of your watercolor paint. If your paint is not flowing on your paper as well as you like give it a try. Today I will demonstrate a wet in wet wash using regular paintas well as paint with ox-gall added so you can see the difference. You will get a more noticible effect on lesser sized paper as highly sized paper help the paint flow naturally.

Natural ox gall is bile usually obtained from cows. It is used as a wetting agent in paints and soap. I am using synthetic ox gall. Ox gall can be added to the paint or the painting water to improve the flow of paint in washes. I did some research but could not find out what the synthetic ox gall was made of. If you know please comment!

You can get a similar effect with soap because it reduces the surface tension of the water and lets the paint go wild. Happy experimenting and have fun!

Bottom line: I bought this product because several people had asked me about it, I really do not find that my paints need help flowing but should I need wetter water this will help!
What is Ox Gall & How to Use it in Watercolor!

Disclaimer, this is the only brand and type of ox gall I have used, others might produce a more dramatic effect.

Credits:
Video production and Craft ideas: Lindsay Weirich
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0

Follow along and have fun!

[fairythere]

My bottle of QOR synthetic ox gal says to use 2 to 6 drops per 8 oz. of water. I put it in my "clean" rinse water and have been happy with the results with less expensive paints!

[jeffb.]

Thank you for your insight into ox gall....being a technical person (engineering) who happens to enjoy creating art, I am drawn to the study of materials science and how substances interact with each othet...your tutorial about ox gall was spot on...thank you and happy holidays to you and yours!

[TheMisterEnderman]

As far as I know Lukas uses actual detergents in their "oxgall". Schmincke however uses real oxgall and their product "O-Netz" has some binder in it too. So from a chemists point of view, you would get the same effect by using handsoap or dishsoap. Nevertheless, there are some soaps which say "ph-neutral" on their package, i guess i would recommend those for archival purposes (a pH of more or less than 7 could ruin your paper/colors after some time).
On the Lukas website they have the ingridients listed: detergents, water, fillers, humectant, additives.
Also you can use oxgall to prepare your metal pallets: when your paints bead up on it, use some soap or oxgall to break down any oils or things that might hurt the surface of your pallet. Your paints will behave much nicer in your lovely watercolorbox!

Greetings from Germany, Lindsay!

[Horsewoman-ptku]

thanks Lindsay! so helpful with the written n verbal info on ox gal. keep sharing. thanks

[yvonnewhitehouse]

Thanks for that. I’m so pleased there is a synthetic ox gall to try.

[Jendollla]

Very cool effect. gonna add that to my ever growing list. lol thanks for sharing.

[shallremainnameless]

Interesting to see this. Always wondered just how much the flow is improved. Thanks for sharing.

[Linda-qqmg]

Thank you for sharing your experiment with us. This was very interesting!

[heidijones]

Going to buy some! Thanks for the tip!

[teri]

I knew you'd know!! It came up today about ox gall vs. soap, , , and there ya go! Thank You for doing this comparison!

[GuildedTraveller]

I really appreciate that you used synthetic ox gall, as someone who doesn't use animal products even in my art supplies, I was really happy to see such a well known Youtube artist show how good a synthetic ox gall works as well! Thank you for this, very helpful, only getting into watercolours so this is a great tip! :)

[KJayPlays]

How did you know I was just about to look into ox gall?! Amazing! Nice to see that you can get it syntheticly too :)

[mariakellner]

I use it when the weather is very hot as we are having now it helps to blend better, gives more time to blend.

[mindofwatercolor]

Hey Lindsay, thanks for covering this. Pretty interesting. I have a bottle of synthetic ox gall that I've yet to experiment with. I wonder if hard or soft water makes a difference. I know that even certain pigments (within the same brand) will differ in movement.

[batvas]

I bought a bottle of ox gall to achieve then minimum shipping level, when I bought Gamsol for my Polychromos set I got for Christmas. Has been curious about ox gall for a long time so I know immediately that a bottle of that was going into my shopping basket. I mixed it with water and added it to the paper and then the paint and there was no difference. . . so tomorrow I will mix it with the paint like you.

[DrawingWithFire]

Great video Lindsay 😆Ox gallery is something I keep forgetting to pick up...gotta remember next time. 😉

[cottonmouthxx]

Thanks so much! I was gifted my dream palette by Schmincke and it comes with a pan of oxgall :)

[rosieleat]

Being vegan, I love that you can get synthetic stuff. I have only just found out about Ox Gall, when it came with a tin of Horadam watercolours. Awesome video thank you! Love the way you get straight to it too!

[terrilea]

Thanks for the ox gall tip. I would love to see you turn that final test paper into a field of tulips :)

[TheSpinDoctor]

If you want to get a smoother flow without the "blooming" effect, you need to have oxgall (yes it is cow bile - synthetic one is same as flow enhancer used in Acrylic painting - a detergent) in BOTH the mixing water AND mixed into the paint. If it is only in one, you get the surface tension change that makes the colour jump uncontrollably.