Binder: a liquid medium mixed with powdered pigments to form a paint.

Composition: the arrangement of elements by an artist in a painting or drawing.

Diluents: liquids, such as turpentine, used to dilute oil paint; the diluent for water-based paint is water.

Earth colors: these colors, the umbers, siennas and ochres, are regarded as the most stable natural pigments.

Fixative: a solution, usually of shellac and alcohol, sprayed onto drawings, particularly charcoal, chalk and soft pastels, to prevent their smudging or crumbling of the support.

Glaze: in painting, a transparent or semi-transparent color laid over another, different color to modify or intensify it.

Hue: the name of a color-red, blue, yellow, etc.-irrespective of its tone or its intensity.

Medium: is a material chosen by the artist for working- paint, ink, pencil, pastel, etc.

Palette: as well as describing the various forms of holders and surfaces for mixing paint colors.

Proportion: the relationship of one part to the whole or other parts. This refers to, for instance, the relation of each component of the human figure to the figure itself, or the painting as a whole.

Shade: term for a color darkened with black.

Size: a weak glue solution used for making gesso and distemper, for stiffening paper, and for making canvas impervious before applying layers of primer or oil paint.

Sketch: a rough drawing or a preliminary draft of a composition, not necessarily to be worked on very much.

Study: a detailed drawing or painting made of one or more parts of a final composition, but not of a whole.

Tint: term for a color lightened with white. Also, in a mixture of colors, the tint is a dominant color.

Tone: the relative darkness or lightness of a color, without reference to its local color.

Value: a alternative word for "tone", "value" is used mainly in the United States.The term tonal value refers to the relative degree of lightness or darkness of any color, on a scale of greys running from black to white.

Volume: the space that a two- dimensional object or figure fills in a drawing or painting.

Wash: a thin, usually broadly applied, layer of transparent or heavily diluted paint or ink.