5/8/2020 Painting Tips: How to Mix Chromatic Black

The Art Tutor and the Chromatic Black

Why Mixing and Using Chromatic Black Is Preferable to Using Black
From a Tube
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"Shadow Rides", oil on canvas, 24x30". This painting was done using chromatic
black and the resulting grays. © Jim Meaders

By Jim Meaders
Updated April 07, 2018

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5/8/2020 Painting Tips: How to Mix Chromatic Black

You don't have to buy black paint. Instead, you can learn to make a rich, deep color that
appears to be black, known as chromatic black. It may seem counterintuitive to take the
time to mix it when you could just buy black paint and be done with it, but if you want
realistic-appearing shadows and gradients in the deep areas of your subject, you need
a black color with a little more subtlety than straight black out of a tube.

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5/8/2020 Painting Tips: How to Mix Chromatic Black

Chromatic black also blends better with the other colors on your palette, as it will be less
dramatically different in color temperature than straight black because you mixed it
yourself with translucent colors rather than a premixed opaque black. You'll better
control the overall tone of your painting and make it more unified if you use a black
mixed with colors you're using elsewhere in the painting.

How to Mix Chromatic Black

A common way of creating a chromatic black is by mixing ultramarine blue with an earth
color, but there are other mixtures that give an even richer, deeper black. Mix equal
parts of Prussian blue, alizarin crimson, and an earth color, such as burnt sienna, burnt
umber, raw sienna, or raw umber. By varying the colors a titch—a touch of more blue or
a touch of more brown—you will end up with a cooler or a warmer black, respectively.
These small differences can add nuance to your shadows and gradient to your colors.

When a chromatic black is added to white, you get some beautiful grays. If these grays
are too blue for you, simply add a little more of the earth color to the original mixture,
which will make the grays look grayer.

Create a Color Chart

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