The same pigment for less

• Within one maker only. A series number is a price tier inside one line: Series 2 at one brand can cost more than Series 4 at another, so tubes are never compared across makers.
• Student lines first. Winton, Van Gogh, Art Creation and Georgian cost less than the same maker's artist line, so they're listed first. After them, tubes run from the lowest series up.
• Alkyd and water-mixable lines are placed roughly. Fast-drying alkyds (Griffin) and water-mixable oils (Artisan, Cobra) have their own series, so they're placed by series number only. Check current prices before choosing between them and an artist line.
• Same pigment, same shade. One pigment can be made lighter or deeper, so tubes are matched by the shade in their names: a cadmium red light with a cadmium red light, a quinacridone rose with a rose, not a violet. Hue tubes are named after a different pigment, so they're matched with the plain version of the pigment they actually contain.

• Pigment load. Student paints often carry less pigment and more filler, so they tint more weakly and you may use more paint for the same color.
• Grade and particle size. One code can cover several grades of the same chemical, which can change the shade, transparency or handling.
• Binder and drying. Alkyd and water-mixable lines behave differently from traditional oil, even with the same pigment.
• Lightfastness. Usually the same for the same pigment, but check each tube's rating; it's shown next to every tube below.

A quick way to compare two tubes: mix a pea-sized amount of each with the same amount of titanium white and look at the strength of the tints side by side.

Earths (ochres, siennas, umbers and oxides) and metallics are left out: a single code such as PR101 Red Iron Oxide (Mars / Burnt Sienna) covers everything from opaque Indian red to transparent oxide, so a shared code says little about the paint. So are natural green earths, natural lapis lazuli, genuine rose madder and stack-process lead white, which share a code with a cheaper material made a different way. Lines that don't publish a series and have no student sibling here, such as Gamblin, Da Vinci and Vasari, have nothing to compare against, so they don't appear.