Mixing recipe
How to mix deep skin tone
Target
#7A4A2E
Recipe mixes to #764C30
A deep skin tone is built from reds, not browns. Cadmium Red and Alizarin Crimson in nearly equal parts give a rich, warm red, and a single part of Sap Green cuts the chroma and turns it to the warm brown of deep skin. It is a complementary mix, so the green has a lot of leverage.
The recipe
Step by step
Build the pile from the biggest, lightest component and work toward the strongest tinter. Check the pile against each swatch before moving on.
- Start with 6 parts Cadmium Redpile #E64333
- Add 5 parts Alizarin Crimsonpile #9F3839Strong tinter. Add it in knife-tip doses and mix fully before adding more.
- Add 1 part Sap Greenpile #764C30Strong tinter. Add it in knife-tip doses and mix fully before adding more.
Another route
Cadmium Yellow, Cadmium Red and Burnt Umber in equal parts is a route from the earths instead. It comes out a touch lighter and more orange, and is a little further off. It is the better choice when the skin is in warm light, and it is easier to control because nothing in it is a complement.
What goes wrong
Alizarin Crimson is transparent and Cadmium Red is opaque, so the pile looks uneven until worked through. The real risk is the green: it is the complement of the red pile, and half a part too much turns the skin to a dull, dead brown. Go in with a knife-tip at a time and stop when the color turns. Alizarin Crimson (flagged by the mixing guide as moving a pile hard for its share) and Sap Green (flagged by the mixing guide as moving a pile hard for its share) are the paints to be careful with here: they go in last, a knife-tip at a time, and a little too much cannot be mixed back out.
Related colors
Results vary with brand, lighting and medium. Acrylic dries a touch darker than it looks wet. Treat this as a mixing aid, not a lab instrument: it tells you which tubes to reach for and roughly in what proportion. Fine-tune the last stretch by eye.