Okay I need to know if I'm losing it or if this is real. My tube of W&N cobalt turquoise, the one I use in basically everything, I'm not exaggerating, it's in like 80% of my pieces, I bought a fresh one last week and it's behaving totally different. The pigment's the same number, same series, but it's lifting off the paper in a way the old one never did. Like it's sitting on top instead of sinking in. And the granulation is almost gone? That soft sandy settle it used to do in the washes was THE thing I loved about it.

I called the art store and the guy was like "maybe they tweaked the binder formulation" and I almost dropped the phone. I have paintings where that specific granulation is doing so much of the heavy lifting and now I have to either stockpile old tubes or figure out how to work with whatever this new version is. I know it sounds dramatic but this color is basically a signature for me at this point. Has anyone else run into this with a specific color you rely on? Like a color that just IS your work and then it changes on you?