Finding Your Way in the Colour Mixing World of Paint - Painting & Drawing Tips

Do you have a favourite Colour?
Does it vary with the seasons?  Has you always favoured the same colour?

As you may have guessed, my favourite colour is Purple.  Not just any purple.  It is one that leans more to Fuchsia than the deep dark royal purple.  

EARLY SNOWFALL - Newest Piece to my Deep in the Forest Series. 
 Matted 14 x 11 $225

Do you struggle with the whole Colour Mixing Thing with your Paints?  One day your feel you haven't and then suddenly your in trouble again.  That's how I feel.  

I have worked on colour mixing, read books, watched tutourials and done samples.  Still at times I feel a little lost.  

Wendy - My kind of Purples!!

My new series "Deep in the Forest" has sparked some new discoveries for me and helped to cement some ideas.  The whole "Purple Thing" turned into a bit of a battle.  I did my practice pieces with different pinks, blues and reds to find the purple I wanted.  I finally settled on a combination of  Ultramarine Blue and Permanent Rose.  I was feeling good again.  

Much later,  I found out why those colours worked for me.

  

I get a regular e-newsletter from Carol McIntyre, of Colorado.  She does amazing things with colour and has written a book I Just Want to Paint: Mixing the Colors You Want! I think her title does recognize the problems with mixing colours.  Her discussions resonate with me and have been very helpful in my journey into mixing colours.  

Close Up of EARLY SNOWFALL - Note the colours and the depth they give on the left side of the squirrel.  (See the original)

She looks at colours as having a colour bias.  So for example my Ultramarine Blue has a blue red bias as opposed to Phalo Blue which has a blue yellow bias.  Therefore since I was looking for a clean bright purple I needed to mix it with a blue with a red bias and a red with a blue bias.  Which is exactly what my tests told me.  When I mixed my Ultramarine (blue red bias) with Quin Red ( Red Orange bias) I was not happy with the colour I got. The Orange bias in the red moved it away from the mauvy purple I wanted.  (See Carol's post here for more information.) 

Using her method also means you are not trying to memorize a lot of different colour recipes.  You just need to look at the colour, decide on its bias and work with it.  It just seems to make more sense to me.

When you look at my Close Up of Early Snowfall you can see why I love that combination of colour for my purple.  Not only does it give you a clean warm glow,  But look at the depth of colour and all the variations it breaks into, when you let it.  I find that very interesting and a great background to compliment my subject.  

Hope this moves you along in your Colour Mixing Journey. 

 

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Wendy