CMYK Aren't Primary Colors for Painting
Sunday June 28, 2009
Every now and then I get another email had telling me I am wrong about red, blue, and yellow being the primary colors for painting, that the correct colors are magenta, cyan, and yellow. Here's part of the latest one: "I am dismayed to see the perpetuation of the misconception that red is a primary color. Any printer or graphic designer knows that the primary colors are magenta, yellow, and cyan. Red is made using magenta and a little bit of yellow..."Indeed, any printer or graphic designer does know CMYK to be their primary colors. That's because the primary colors used as printing inks are different to the primary colors used in color mixing for painting. The two things are different.
You can, of course, get good results if you use pure CMY paint colors, which some paint manufacturers do produce. But if you limit yourself to these, you're limiting the joys that come from the different characteristics of different pigments used to make paints.
In printing red is made from magenta and yellow printed on top of one another (not mixed), but in painting a red can be selected from a wide range of pigments, each with its own color character and degree of opacity/transparency (Know Your Reds). You can use a red as is, mix it with other colors (physical mixing), or use it as a glaze (optical mixing). You've far more options with paint than printing ink.
Using single-pigment paints for color mixing rather than colors made from multiple pigments is part of successful color mixing. This information can be found on the labels of paint tubes (though most people don't look at the small print).
There are many reds, yellows, and blues in paint that are made from single pigments. Learning the characteristics of individual pigments and how they mix with others is part of learning to paint. Every red mixed with every blue doesn't produce a decent purple just because painting color theory says Red+Blue=Purple. The individual pigments give different results and you have to be selective, to learn what red pigment with what blue gives what type of purple when mixed in what proportions. Likewise red and yellow for oranges, blue and yellow for greens.
See Also:
• What You Need to Know About Color Mixing
• Color Theory Problem Solver
• Top 5 Color Mixing Tips for Painting
Image ©Marion Boddy-Evans. Licensed to About.com, Inc
Comments
A blue, red or yellow may have a colour bias which can affect the mix. For example, a blue may be biased to green (cool) or red(warm).
so if you want to make a green (blue plus yellow), a red biased blue and a red biased yellow will not produce a sparkling green.
I have been a graphic designer for almost 30 years, and while I have seen a lot of things and a lot of changes, I have never heard CMYK called primary colors.
I suggest that any designer who thinks CMYK are the primary colors do some research. Because designers who prepare for press and work with customer or use computers know that there are may color schemes out there. However in order to do 4 COLOR PROCESS printing everything has to be converted to Process or CMYK.
I have also been an artist for longer, and there are many artist out there that know the color wheel (not the same as a pms book) but know nothing about CMYK, RGB, or printing.
It’s like compairing apples and oranges.
In the world of ART, for that matter in many matters of life it IS the color wheel.
CMYK only exists in the world of 4 color process printing, which lives only as long as the 4 color press lives. In case the graphic designes haven’t noticed a lot of us are losing out jobs to digital printing and web designers.(oops no CMYK there!)
Deborah is correct.
My view, born of about thirty years of trying to understand colour, is that the 12 colours of the rainbow are the base colours in all of nature. When pigments were first ground from natural materials, those colours were the objectives, instinctively or otherwise. The available commercial colours that match the rainbow are
(Titanium White)
Cadmium Yellow Pale
Cadmium Yellow
Cadmium Orange
Cadmium Scarlet
Cadmium Red
Quinacridone Rose
Dioxazine Violet
French Ultramarine
Thalo Blue
Thalo Green
Cadmium Green Pale
With those 12 spectrum colours in your palette, you can mix all colours. I think! One thing I enjoy the most about painting is that there’s always another idea!
I also have been painting for more than 30 years and was a printer at age 14.
As an artist I am tired of being told that I have to have a palette of more than three to six colors or my art will suffer, not to mention my ability to mix color.
All of that is nonsense, and is nothing more than a careless generalization applied to the whole of the industry.
Using pure tube color may be the norm these days, but in fact simply goads the artist into buying more colors and as a result in mixing less.
One sees a lot of bad art these days because the artist cannot handle their palette of 32 colors.
The primaries plus black and white make an excellent palette, even for the seasoned artist, if you take the time to learn to paint.
I totally agree with the last commentator, I buy the basic red, yellow and blue, black and white and mix my own colors. I rarely use burnt umber, ochre or varying shades of green and only when I absolutely cannot get the exact color I am trying for without the specialty paint. Part of the art of painting is mixing your own colors- just my opinion!
Indeed, you don’t need a boxful of colors to paint with beautiful results. And working with a limited range means you’re more likely to become totally familiar with the possibilities and potential of each individually and mixed. I have a lot of paint colors, but in a single painting generally use only a handful. What they are changes with time.
With paint, unlike printing colors, we’ve a choice of which red, yellow, or blue we use as different pigments are used for reds, yellows, or blues and the results achieved when these are mixed changes depending on which particular pigment you’ve selected as your red, blue, or yellow. With printer’s ink, you’ve only one of each.
“In printing red is made from magenta and yellow printed on top of one another”
I didn’t know this. Very interesting, as magenta appears bluish to me like an Alizarin or Quinacridone Rose. Cadmium Red seems much more a pure red to my eye. Personally, I prefer a red more yellowish to my eye like Venetian Red or Light Red, but my main work is in skin. For someone who wanted to paint a red vehicle or something pure red, I’d certainly go for Cadmium Red. Magenta? Nah, I’m a lazy, practical artist who works in a straight line, and putting yellow in Magenta just to make it red doesn’t make much practical sense to me.
Tina — Next time you’re near a very large poster (bus stop advert size) take a close look, especially near the edges. (People will think you’re nuts, but ignore them…) Sometimes you see the individual dots making up the colors. Pointillism works in a similar way — optical magic.
I feel the simplest explanation is that there are two sets of primaries, one for light, MCY and one for pigment, RYB.
I have to disagree with the opening statement. CYMK aren’t primaries for painting. I’m an Art teacher and keen painter. I have in the past made the mistake of teaching the primaries to be Red, Yellow and Blue. I have since realised that Cyan Yellow Magenta are without doubt the real primary colours for painting and for everything. It’s the only colour scheme that makes sense. The human eye is sensitive to RED, BLUE and GREEN. This has been verified by psychologists. In additive mixing (mixing of light) Red and Green make yellow, Blue and Red make Magenta, Blue and Green make Cyan. CYM are the secondary colours in when mixing additively. The inverse is true of subtractive mixing. Magenta and Yellow for example make Red. It’s plain as day. Red is not primary and is thus proved by mixing yellow and magenta. Simple as. Using CYM as the primaries for painting makes so much more sense. A much greater range of colour is possible. Purple can now be mixed happily from the true primary colours. I can’t understand why people have a difficulty accepting what is as plain as day. Well done to the printers for adopting CYMK. Why artist’s have been so slow to take it up is beyond me.
“if you limit yourself to CMYK, you’re limiting the joys that come from the different characteristics of different pigments used to make paints.”