Marble has a extremely broad variety of colors and prototypes. Or mostly be deficient of patterns. Transparent oil-glaze is the most common medium used for marbling nowadays. You can make your own but it is much more convenient to buy ready-made glaze. For most marbles, the best surface to work on is one which has a good coat of white eggshell paint. Or even two coats. Make sure you are working in an area which is as dust-free as possible.
Since nearly everyone who executes marbling work is also a grainer, the two arts are often associated and they have a certain amount in common. Success in both depends upon long and Continuous study of the natural material and, in the case of marble, this is often difficult, since good specimens are not easily come by. Yet only by close and prolonged examination can the student gain the knowledge of markings and formations which is essential if he is to reproduce marbles in paint with any degree of skill and assurance.
The colors used in marbling are richer and more variegated than those employed in graining, and the effects are obtained largely by means of glazes rather than by the use of opaque colors. The whole process is more flexible than graining, for the markings are far more irregular than those of wood, and, moreover, the same piece of marble may exhibit wide variations both in colouring and veining on different parts of its surface.