Brown. ?

[Ricktarsprayer75]

Help....i cant mix any type of brown. Ive googled it red and green, blue and orange etc but i cant get anywhere near the brown i want.
Im trying to paint a bird and theres at least 3 different browns.
I dont have any green so have to mix my own. I have illustration colours, cobalt blue, red, yellow.
No matter how i mix them its either a dirty orange colour or a greenish colour.
I resorted to sepia and white which turns out greyish and cold looking.
Ive started the pic and the colours are way off so its going to have to be a sylised piece.
Ill post a pic of the reference.
Im wondering whether my colours are too cold or warm ( tint wise ).
Im also trying to mix in the cup. Am i trying to do the impossible or will it be ewsier to mix in a bottle. Im wasting quite a bit of paint

 

[Malky]

Help....i cant mix any type of brown. Ive googled it red and green, blue and orange etc but i cant get anywhere near the brown i want.
Im trying to paint a bird and theres at least 3 different browns.
I dont have any green so have to mix my own. I have illustration colours, cobalt blue, red, yellow.
No matter how i mix them its either an orange colour or a greenish colour.
I resorted to sepia and white which turns out greyish and cold looking.
Ive started the pic and the colours are way off so its going to have to be a sylised piece.
Ill post a pic of the reference.

If you want to mix browns you can use the three primary colours red, yellow and blue, in varying amounts depending on what brown you want, for example a reddish brown as on your bird would involve more red, a greening brown (olive) would involve less red and so on, but the the problem is you colours have to be strictly primaries, cobalt is a mixed blue so it's not a primary and would most likely interfere with your mix, ultramarine blue is closer to a primary, the best way ensure you have true primaries is to buy a primary set, with the three primaries and black and white you should be able to mix any colour at all including just about any shade of brown at all, but using mixed versions of any of the three colours will usually end in disappointment

 

[Nada]

Mix your orange equal amounts red yellow

Slowly add your blue.
Do it in an outside container first.
Also make a color wheel with the three colors closest to primary you have.. Takes 3 minutes

Blue is very very overpowering. So go slow.

 

[Nada]

Once your close you can warm or cool as need be.

 

[Nada]

Actually I would probably do 2 parts yellow one red.. Don't have illustration colors to test.

 

[Nada]

And always remember... You cannot make primaries. Once you alter one.. You can never shift back.

 

[Squishy]

Yes, primaries are best for colour mixing, does take a little getting used to before you get the hang of it, but IMO an invaluable skill, as many times a bottle isn't going to match what you need.

I tend to just mix a small amount, and make a note of the proportions, adjusting until I get it right - I.e one drop yellow, 1 red, 2 blue etc, then scale up and mix more if needed. Nothing worse than running out with only a teeny bit to do, and then not remembering your recipe.

O thought I was rubbish at it, then watched a vid of Mitch's where it took him 17 attempts at a colour - just the way it goes sometimes, though the more you do, the easier ot is.

 

[Ricktarsprayer75]

I wanted to use the illustration colours for obvious reasons but i do have a set of wicked primary colours.
I will have a go with those.
I had a feeling the cobalt blue would throw everything off.
Cheers everyone.
I cant keep resorting to sepia to darken or use as a brown.

 

[Malky]

I wanted to use the illustration colours for obvious reasons but i do have a set of wicked primary colours.
I will have a go with those.
I had a feeling the cobalt blue would throw everything off.
Cheers everyone.
I cant keep resorting to sepia to darken or use as a brown.

But you would achieve better results with umber or burnt umber instead of sepia, sepia has too much greenness to it whereas umber is warm just like the browns on your bird.

As an example, If I paint a tiger, I usually do the whole tiger in monotone just using umber, I build it up in layers adding any detail needed such as the texture of the fur and detail in the eyes and stuff, and then if needed I reinstate any shadows and anything else hidden by the layering process, once I;m happy with my monotone under painting, I add using transparent orange leaning more towards red, this combined with the umber gives me the reddish brown natural to tigers, I will then create variations in the browns by going over some areas with transparent yellow or red depending on which way I need it to shift, another big bonus of working with umber is that if you have to use white at anytime you won'y get blue shift since it contains orange, some add orange to white to counteract blue shift, but I like my whites to stay pure.

Try this method on a test example of your bird, you might just see that it's ideal for you, and you can even further enhance what your doing by getting hold of some transparent red ochre and and yellow ochre which will give even more control over any shifts you make.

 

[Ricktarsprayer75]

I,ll have to invest in a secondary set of paints at least as i struggle to mix greens as well.
Thing is ive never had to use brown or green in any pics ive done so im only just finding a problem.
I could do with an alchemy degree .
Umber and ochre are on the list as well as some transparents. The trans that i do have are auto air.
I think meechel said that wicked detail are trans as well.
As i said i,ll try experimenting with the wicked.
Trial and error and keeping note of the recipe.

 

[Nada]

I,ll have to invest in a secondary set of paints at least as i struggle to mix greens as well.
Thing is ive never had to use brown or green in any pics ive done so im only just finding a problem.
I could do with an alchemy degree .
Umber and ochre are on the list as well as some transparents. The trans that i do have are auto air.
I think meechel said that wicked detail are trans as well.
As i said i,ll try experimenting with the wicked.
Trial and error and keeping note of the recipe.

Wicked detail is not technically transparent.. However if you reduce it enough you can get transparent effects

Umbers and oochres are staple colors in my kit.. They just save me a lot of time.
I like to work straight whenever I can. But if it's really critical I mix it.

 

[musicmacd]

Great advise here, regarding your post Green-red orange-blue these mixes make greys nots browns!! That's probably what you found out!!!

 

[Ricktarsprayer75]

Yes, i googled it and the info i got was that a primary mixed with its complimentary makes brown.
So i tried blue and orange but i have cobalt blue so that didnt work.
I tried red and green and that ended up as an olive type dirty looking colour, obviously using the cobalt blue again with yellow to make green. Even the green looked awful.
When i go working away from home im going to invest in some straight colours, i think i,ll get the dru blair colour wheel set 18 bottle set.
I,ll use wicked primaries today to experiment.

 

[AndreZA]

Try orange and black.

 

[Ricktarsprayer75]

Will do andreZA.
But how do i gain lighter shades? Would i add more yellow? Or is it a case of reducing more? Obviously if i add any white it will go grey?
Ive been reading about the colour wheel for the last hour and ive totally baffled myself, theres a lot of contradicting theory out there.

 

[musicmacd]

Lighter = add white
Darker = Sepia/black/umber's

The info you got was wrong, mixing complimentary colours cancel the saturation of the colours all the way grey
Maybe print off a colour wheel and check out Dru Blairs website for colour theory

 

[musicmacd]

Reducing the paint makes a transparent version not really lighter. Colbalt Blue is a great Blue for mixing !!

 

[Ricktarsprayer75]

Lighter = add white
Darker = Sepia/black/umber's

The info you got was wrong, mixing complimentary colours cancel the saturation of the colours all the way grey
Maybe print off a colour wheel and check out Dru Blairs website for colour theory

I dont mean to go on if i make a brown from orange and black i was under the impression that adding white to any mixed colour containing black would result in a grey?
Im just mixing colours today ( no painting ) to see what happens.
I will check on that site as well.
Thanks macd

 

[Ronald art]

green and red will give you a brown , yellow with either blue or black will give you a green , if the brown is to dark mix in white .

 

[musicmacd]

I dont mean to go on if i make a brown from orange and black i was under the impression that adding white to any mixed colour containing black would result in a grey?
Im just mixing colours today ( no painting ) to see what happens.
I will check on that site as well.
Thanks macd

It would make light brown!! Black and white would make grey!! It gets deep but you can get your head around by just practicing! And asking questions!