Watercolor Web

Any time you select a set of paints, you are choosing a gamut or a range of colors that you can mix. There is no magical combination of paint that will enable you to mix every color. For example, you can mix orange from a combination of red and yellow, but the orange mixed with the two paints will not be nearly as saturated as an pure orange paint.

Your choice of paints should depend on your style and subject matter. Figure painters need to be able to mix a range of flesh tones, and landscape painters need to mix greens easily.

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Burnt umber is the base for darker skin tones. To that mixture I add cadmium red light and/or cadmium orange along with a some raw sienna. In the shadows, I often add ultramarine blue, perylene maroon, or ultramarine violet in the shadows.

Here is an example of a quick sketch that uses burnt umber, cadmium red light, raw sienna, and ultramarine blue. There may also be some perylene maroon in the shadows.

African American Skin Tone

There are two rules for mixing darks in watercolor. First, use plenty of paint and water, and, second, pick the right combination of paints.

If I have to paint a large dark passage, I will often set out my paints in mixing cups instead of grabbing paint from a palette well. I will use one cup for each single pigment and then let the colors combine on the page.

I squeeze out lots of paint, roughly the same amount I would use if I were squeezing out toothpaste to go on a toothbrush. Then, I add enough water to bring the paint to the consistency of heavy cream. As I am painting the darks, I try never to rinse my brush until I finish the passage.

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Brands I use:

M. Graham, Daniel Smith, Winsor & Newton, daVinci

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