Mixing Paint Colors for Art Work

Many artists mix their own colors rather than spending extra money for specific shades. Whether you’re using oils or acrylics the mixed result will be the same. Liquid acrylic craft paints and cake or tube water colors can also be mixed to achieve new shades. Become familiar with the paints you’re using by experimenting with the color mixtures so you’ll know what shades you can achieve. Mix them directly on the palette or in paint pots.

Red and Blue

Mix equal parts of red and blue to achieve a purple shade. Adding white will lighten the achieved shade into lavender colors. White added to any shade of red turns pink. Add more or less white to get the pink shade desired. The more red that is used the darker the shade of pink will be. Less red or more white gives lighter shades of pink. Adding a small amount of yellow to the pink will result in a light natural looking flesh tone. Small amounts of orange and brown added to the pink results in darker flesh tones.

Blue and Yellow

Yellow added to blue results in green. The more yellow that is added the lighter the green shade will be. Less yellow means a darker green, such as a forest green. A small amount of blue added to forest green will result in a bluish green which could be used to paint water scenes or the blue spruce tree. Many grasses in scenes of fields and meadows can be done with the varied shades of light green. Almost all tree leaves need lighter and darker shades of green.

Black and White

White added to black results in shades of gray. Use less white for darker grays and more for the lighter gray shades. A small amount of blue added to a gray gives the smoky blue gray shades of distant mountains in the scenery or backgrounds of paintings. White with just a touch of black added results in an off white that may be used for shadows in snow or white caps on ocean waves.

Red and Yellow

Mixing equal parts of red and yellow will result in an orange shade. Using less red or more yellow will lighten the mixture to a pumpkin orange color. More red will result in darker orange colors such as the ones that would be used to paint fruit in pictures. Either mixture can be lightened with a small amount of white. Darken a light orange color with a very small amount of brown to achieve darker skin tones.

Paint Color Categories and Terms

Blue, red and yellow are considered the “primary “colors. These are used to achieve the “secondary” colors of green, orange and violet. The “tertiary” colors are the shades achieved by mixing other colors with the primary or secondary colors. Learning the color wheel and the relationship each color has to the one beside it will help tremendously in getting the shade you want. Other terms to become familiar with are the “hue”, or the name of the color. Blue, red, and yellow are hues. The “value” of the color is the lightness or darkness of the color. “Intensity” is the strength of the color. For example an intense red would be very dark and very red.