How to Mix Black

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This article was co-written by Jeanine Hattas Wilson. Jeanine Hattas Wilson is an artist and president of Hattas Public Murals. With nearly 20 years of experience, Jeanine specializes in the production, supervision, design and painting of wall frescoes. Jeanine holds a bachelor’s degree in advertising from Marquette University and attended the Milwaukee Institute of Art & Design. She studied at the Artelier Artien School in Paris, France, and the Academy of Figurative Arts Los Angeles with the guidance of famous artists such as Robert Liberace, Michael Siegel and William Cochran. To date, Hattas Public Murals has produced nearly 5,000 works of art indoors and in commercial and public spaces.

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Black paint is often used, but you may not have available black paint or want to mix black in another shade. You can mix black from red, yellow, and blue in equal proportions, or combine complementary colors like blue and orange, red and green, and yellow and purple. Mixing blue with brown can give a dark black color.

Table of Contents

Black paint

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Mix red, blue and yellow paint. Black is the darkest color, but you can still change the black tint when blending. The shades of red, blue, and yellow used will determine the hue of black. You can use oil colors, watercolors or acrylic paints. ^{[1] X Research Source}

Using Cobalt Yellow (Aurepin), Rose Madder Genuine and Cobalt Blue will make a light black color, while using Winsor Yellow, Dark Pink color Variable (Permanent Alizarin Crimson) and Dark Blue (Winsor Blue) will mix dark black.
If you have a primary color lightning, red, blue, and yellow will blend into black. The two popular colors red and blue are magenta and blue.

Sweep or pour each color onto the palette in separate locations. You should pour all the colors on the board before proceeding to mix. Take an amount of about 1.3 cm of each color. To blend basic black, you use equal proportions of the colors.

Increase the proportions of one or two colors in the mix to get a different shade of black.
If you’re using a brush on the board, don’t forget to use a separate brush for each color so you don’t get mixed up.
You can’t make the exact black as you did last time, so mix as much color as you need.

Mix colors together. You can use a paintbrush to blend colors. For paint, use a tinting trowel or metal tinting tool. Invert the color mixture for at least 15 seconds to ensure that no individual colors remain.

If you’re using a brush to blend paint, swirl the brush gently, don’t press too hard. You will damage the brush if you press down hard on the palette.

Adjust the black value and tint. Depending on what you use black for, it will mix black with different shades. You can add a little white paint to make the black lighter, or add a little blue paint to create a night sky. ^{[2] X Research Source}

If you have enough time and color, experiment. Add a bit of brown or green to the black to paint the tree at night, or add a bit of yellow to make the sun reflect on the black metal.
Manual tinting often doesn’t get an accurate black, it will turn to a different shade instead of pure black.

Blending complementary colors

Combine red with green. Blending opposite colors on the color wheel removes the color property of each color and obtains a dark color. You can choose any red or green color depending on the black you want. Phthalo Green and Naphthp Red are a great combination to create a basic black. ^{[3] X Research Sources}

Mix blue with orange. Take an amount of blue, such as Cobalt Blue, and an amount of orange, such as Translucent Orange into the palette. Gently blend the two colors together until a glossy black is obtained. If you combine two colors in equal proportions but the black is not dark enough, you can add a little blue to the mix. ^{[4] X Research Sources}

Mix yellow with purple. Mix purple and yellow in a ratio of 6-4, adjust the ratio to get the black you want. Cadmium Yellow is the standard color that can be combined with burgundy.

Mix blue and brown

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Start with Ultramarine Blue. Take an amount of Ultramarine blue on the palette. Blue makes up more than half of the color mix, so use as much color as you need. ^{[5] X Research Sources}

Take a bit of Burnt Umber to the palette. Do not put two colors in the same place, but leave about 1cm apart. Then gently blend the two colors together. Adjust the scale until you get the desired black.

Add a bit of Prussian Blue. If you want darker and deeper blacks, you can add a bit of Spectrum Blue. This new color mixture is suitable for painting the night sky.

Advice

Always wear old clothes and cover surfaces when working with black paint.

Things you need

Red paint
Blue paint
yellow paint
Green paint
Orange paint
Purple paint
Brown paint
Palette
Brush, trowel or scraper

Steps

Black paint

Blending complementary colors

Mix blue and brown

Advice

Things you need

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