Color Mixing Tutorials & Resources For Oil Paints

One of the biggest challenges for artists just starting out with oil painting is mixing colors. Color is a powerful tool. If handled improperly, things can become quite messy. Improperly mixed colors lead to muddy or unbalanced paintings. The good news is, with practice, you will become more skilled at mastering color in your oil paintings. I have collected a number of color mixing tutorials below including links to articles, videos and books. I hope you find these oil painting color mixing resources helpful.

VIDEOS:

How to Mix Colors for Oil Paints

All About Color

How to Mix Oil Paint -- Video Lessons with Hall Groat II




ARTICLES:

How to Make Better Oil Paintings: Tips & Techniques for Correctly Mixing Color

This is a great post from EmptyEasel.com that talks about correctly mixing colors from a limited palette of only 8 colors. Read the rest of this color mixing tutorial here.

Oil Painting Tips Part 2: Mixing Colors to get Brown and Black

Here is another great post from EmptyEasel.com and is a continuation of the post above that demonstrates mixing oil colors to get browns and blacks. Read this lesson here.

Bill Martins’ Guide to Oil Painting -- Mixing Colors

In this post, Bill Martin talks about his full spectrum of oil colors and how he mixes tints of these colors using titanium white. Read this tutorial here.

Color Theory & Mixing -- 16 Lessons in Colour Theory

This is a very thorough 16 part lesson from Wet Canvas covering color theory and color mixing. It covers everything from the history of color to the Psychology of Color. View these lessons here.

Notes on Colour Mixing by Andrew Newland

On the following page, artist Andrew Newland has provided an introduction to the theory of colour mixing.
He has intended this tutorial as a practical guide to the art of mixing oil paints. Also included is a related color mixing excercise to give yousome It is intended as a practical guide to the mixing of paints and has a related Colour mixing exercise. View this lesson and excercise here.

 

BOOKS:

You Asked – Recipes for Mixing Acrylic Paints?

Today’s questions comes from Pierre:

“Hi, I’m looking for a site or a person that have recipes to mix acrylic paints.

Examples: Recipe for vibrant greens, reds, blacks…etc

Thank you”

Do you have any information that may help Pierre?

Please leave your response in the comment box below.  Thank You!

Oil Painting Lessons – Tips on Color Mixing and Theory

When I first began painting some 10 years ago, I recall how intimidating it all seemed. With all of the various colors, mediums, brushes and other tools available, it was enough to make my head spin.

While learning about the various brushes and mediums was a bit confusing, the biggest challenge for me was how to accurately depict nature and other real life objects on canvas using color.

How do I make a color lighter or darker? What about making realistic shadows or highlights? This article will shed some colorful light on the situation, and with practice, working with color in your oil paintings will become easier and more enjoyable.

Thank God for the beautiful Sun, for without it, we would not see color. Everything would appear dark and colorless.

Thankfully, the light from the Sun also travels in a straight line. If it didn’t, we wouldn’t have the wonderful variety of light and shadow that makes everything so enjoyable to paint.

If you take an apple for instance, and put it outside in the grass in the sunlight, you will notice several different values that the light creates when shining on the apple.

You have the main overall tone of the apple, the shadow on the apple, the cast shadow, reflection from nearby objects like the green grass and the sky, and highlights. Our job as painters is to accurately depict these values on canvas using color.

There are so many different oil colors on the market today. All of these different colors come from the six colors that make up the spectrum – red, orange, yellow, green, blue, violet.

Colors have four main properties – value, intensity, temperature and hue. The value of a color refers to how light or dark a color is. The intensity of a color refers to how bright or dull it is – also known as a colors saturation or purity. If you used yellow straight from the tube, it would have a higher intensity then if you mixed it with white. The temperature refers to how warm or cool a color is. Colors range in temperature from warm yellows and oranges to cool blues and violets. Finally, the hue is just another word for color. An apple and a cherry are both hues of red.

Color mixing is not an exact science. Artists have different formulas and methods for mixing and applying paint, so the following tips are general guidelines and not necessarily rules that must be followed.

When mixing colors don’t over mix. Over mixing a color will take the life out of it.

To create highlights in your paintings, use white with a touch of the objects complimentary color. There are some exceptions however. When painting highlights on certain objects like brass for instance, which can be depicted on canvas using yellow, making a lighter yellow tinted with white can create a convincing highlight.

Cast shadows of objects are complimentary to the color that the shadow is cast upon. For instance, the cast shadow of a red apple on a blue tablecloth would be orange.

To get any desired color, try to mix as few colors as possible.

Try to keep the theme of your painting either all warm or all cool in temperature.

Again, color mixing is not an exact science. If you survey 10 artists and ask them various questions about mixing oil paint, you will likely get many different answers. My advice is to keep painting and practicing until you develop your own formulas and techniques that you are comfortable with. Happy Painting and God Bless!

Art Lesson: Learn About Color Schemes for Your Next Painting

Much research and experimentation has been done on color and how it can effect a persons mood and behavior. Certain colors can calm a person, while others can stimulate excitement or cheerfulness. That being said, you may want to think carefully on the type of color scheme you choose for your next painting. This article will talk about five different color schemes you can use to plan out your next painting. The tips in this article can be applied to any painting medium.

Painting is all about harmony. Harmony in a painting is when the arrangement of colors and objects are pleasing to the viewers eyes. As a painter you can either put too much into a painting or not enough. If your painting is too chaotic you may scare the viewer away. On the other hand, if your painting lacks something, it may be perceived as boring, and your viewer will not be engaged, so it’s important to have balance in your color arrangements.

ANALOGOUS COLOR SCHEME

This color scheme uses colors that are next to one another on the color wheel. With an analogous color scheme, one color is usually the dominant one, while the others serve as an accent to the dominant color. You are limited in colors when using this scheme but that does not mean your paintings have to be boring. Just vary the intensity (how dull or bright a color is) and value (how light or dark a color is) to make your painting more interesting and pleasing to the eye. An example of three colors next to each other on the color wheel, that can be used in an analogous color scheme are orange, yellow and yellow-orange. Use only a few different colors with the analogous color scheme. If you add too many, you may destroy the harmony in your painting.

COMPLEMENTARY COLOR SCHEME

The complimentary color scheme is a good choice if you want strong contrast in your painting. Complimentary colors are colors that are opposite each other on the color wheel. Examples of complementary color schemes are reds with greens, oranges with blues and violets with yellows. You shouldn’t feel limited when using this color scheme. For instance, instead of using plain orange, you could use colors on either side like red-orange and yellow orange. Instead of using plain blue, you could use combinations like blue-violet or blue green. You could also vary the intensity and values as well. It can be difficult to create balance with this color scheme. To avoid ruining harmony, choose one dominant color and use the complimentary color as accents. For instance in a yellow and violet complementary color scheme, you could make the main subject and background violets and accent remaining parts of the painting in yellows.

TRIADIC COLOR SCHEME

The triadic color scheme uses three colors that are evenly spaced or equidistant from one another on the color wheel. This scheme produces strong contrast but still retains harmony. This color combination is more challenging for beginners. You can get carried away by making all three colors too intense thereby destroying the balance in your painting. You should allow one color to dominate and use the two other colors to accent the rest of the painting.

MONOCHROMATIC COLOR SCHEME

This color scheme is probably the easiest for beginners to work with. The monochromatic color scheme uses variations in value and intensity of only one color. Beginners like this color scheme because they only need to create a value plan using one color, which makes things a lot easier. Your painting will not be as exciting as other schemes that utilize more than one color, but your painting will produce a peaceful and soothing effect.

SPLIT COMPLEMENTARY COLOR SCHEME

The split-complimentary color scheme uses three colors and is a twist on the complimentary color scheme. Instead of using the colors compliment, you will use the two colors adjacent to its compliment on the color wheel. For instance, Red, Yellow-Green and Blue-Green could be a split complimentary color scheme.

Don’t let color theory intimidate or discourage you. Working with color in your paintings takes some getting used to. With time and practice you will begin to develop the eye of a good painter. A great way to learn more about the use of color in paintings is to view the art of experienced painters. Make some plans to head out to a museum or visit an online gallery. God Bless and Happy painting!