As if I don't have enough to spend my money on as it is.  Yesterday I was in Art Essentials with a freind.  There was a display rack there from Winsor Newton and Grumbacher.  They had of all things water soluable oil paint.  I picked up a brochure.  Next day, I was back and $100 later, I had a minimal set of paints and a couple of canvas boards.  Now, while I am no great artist, I am no beginner either.  I started oil painting about 20 years ago.  Last time I had a brush in my hand was about 8 years ago.  Sort of lost interest.  I got tired of the turpentine and the smell.  I lost interest for other reasons, such as no convinient classes at the local adultry education, and other reasons.

    So, here is my quicky impression of water based oil paint.

    1. It ain't exactly the same.  Now mind you, as  I am writing this, I have one hour of time at the canvas with this paint.  Also, I am pretty rusty, so many factors could cloud my judgement here.  One of the ways it does not seem the same is the way the painting medium mixes with the paint.  It seems to take very little to thin the paint down, which also does not seem to be very thick in the first place.  The feel of the paint going on the canvas also seems to be different (although, I did this on canvas board, rather than a stretched canvas, so that and a bad memory may have something to do with it).  Also, the paint I put on with a palette knife did not seem to go on the same either, but this could also be bad memory.

    2.  It is pretty similar in the way paint will mix on the canvas.  It is just as easy to blend from one color to the next just like regular oil.

    3. Overall feeling is mixed.  I am going to try to decide on a real project to do to really give the paint a test.  I suspect I am going to like this stuff once I get used to it.  I has little oder.  On a scale of 0 to 10, with 10 being standard oil paint, this stuff is a 1.  It has even less oder I think than acrylic paint does.

    My recomendation.  If you don't mind spending a couple of hundred dollars for a new set of paints, and you currently use oils, you might want to consider this stuff.  If you are using acrylic paint, don't bother.  If you don't like oil paint, you won't like this stuff either.  But if the only reason you don't use oil is the smell, you might want to give this stuff a try.   And this brings up compatability.

    You can use the water soluable oils with regular oils.  No problem.  But acrylic is a different story, or actually, the same old story.  You can put oil paint over acrylic, but you cannot put acrylic over oil, even the water soluable oils.

    Maybe soon I can post some pictures of my paintings, that way I can be publicly humiliated.