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Struggling to make crimson red gradients help please
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Message
Posted
can anyone else have issues making crimson?
I'm trying to achieve a certain effect (like pic below) but I'm finding it rock hard!
I've tried hookers green and burnt umber with the primary red I have but it's not working at all.
it's strange that I have no problem getting crimson with my watercolors.
Posted
I am far from expert at mixing paints, I have learned a bit in the last couple of months but lack the experience of some of them. I can see light blue in the highlights and black shadows and the red looks like a spot of blue in it to neutralise it a bit. I am sure someone will shoot that down but that would be my guess.
Having just said that I run Flux (to keep my circadian rhythm in tune with the sun my monitor shifts colours throughout the day) so maybe I am not even seeing the same thing as you.
Posted
Maybe the wrong red, black does over power but with something like Pyrrole red it has a pretty strong pigment itself.
I used Pyrrole and burnt sienna to make rust colours or add black to it to get dark reds. (Black is really like an intense blue, which is why black and yellow gives green) Blue will dull red, which is why it was my first suggestion but some reds and blues are warmer and cooler so the two shades don't always negate eachother if they are both heavy in one direction.
Colour mixing is a science and no two colours are the same which is why I can only refer to the ones I use with any certainty.
Posted
You're after a crimson acrylic? It's very hard to mix it - crimsons tend to be transparent, while most scarlet reds are opaque, so you're likely, as you've noticed, to get a dirty red if you try toning it down to make anything approximating to crimson.
You're going to have to buy it: try Quinacridone red or magenta; Alizarin/alizarine crimson (it's not real Alizarin, that pigment isn't compatible with acrylic) - or Pyrrole Red, Perylene Red, Naphthol Crimson/Red.
Posted
Thanks Robert.... the reasons for switching to watercolor keep mounting up :(
I'll go tomorrow to hobbycraft & if they don't have a strong dark red in acrylic I think I'll buy a load of watercolors, I've tried with acrylics and gotten pleasure out of what I've done so far but I just feel like giving up if I can't even get the colors I need whats the point.
Posted
You wouldn't be able to mix a convincing crimson in any medium, though .... this is no reflection on you, it's just that it really can't be done; you can darken any red with a touch of green, but that gives you dark red, not crimson. Look out for pigments with the letters PV19 (often listed as Quinacridone Violet/Red/or Magenta) - you can darken those with other transparent colours, eg pthalo green VERY carefully (because it's transparent: opaque greens won't work - and very carefully, because it's extremely powerful), or even with a touch of ultramarine. If you want an opaque dark red, Cadmium Red Deep or Winsor Red Deep would suit you - just depends on what you want to achieve.
Somewhere, there's an acrylic colour for almost any application - at least as many in acrylic ranges as there are in watercolours and oils. The snag can be finding it.
Posted
I found working with acrylics very frustrating initially regarding mixing colours. I ended up buying a book by Ian Sidaway, called "Acrylic Artists' Colour Mixing Bible". It tells you how to mix any colour under the sun using basic acrylic colours. It also gives you an idea of what your basic pallet should be to mix all these colours.
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