Mixing guide
How to mix gray without black
A gray mixed from two opposite colors stays alive. A gray made with black goes dead. Here is how to make the first kind.
Black knocks a color back by removing its light, which is why a color tempered with black looks dull rather than quiet. A gray mixed from two colors that sit opposite each other keeps the light and loses only the saturation, and that is the difference between a shadow that breathes and one that sits there like a hole.
The workhorse pair is ultramarine and burnt sienna. Between them they make every gray a landscape or a portrait needs, and because you control the ratio you can push the result warm or cool at will. Add white and the whole range opens up again as a family of quiet tints.
The trick is that there is no single gray. There is a warm gray and a cool gray and a hundred in between, and choosing which one is most of the decision.
The mixtures
Each one worked out on a real palette with the spectral model. The number after the mixture is how far it lands from the target: under 2 you cannot see the difference, under 4 it does not matter in a painting.
Neutral mid gray #8A8A88
The middle of the value scale, with no lean either way.
8× Titanium White +5× Ultramarine +1× Burnt Umber
8× Ultramarine +7× Titanium White +3× Yellow Ochre
This palette cannot quite reach that color with 3 pigments in one mixture. What you see is the closest it gets, which is worth knowing before you spend an afternoon trying.
8× Ultramarine +5× Burnt Sienna +3× Lemon Yellow
Thin wash, roughly 1 part paint to 4 parts water.
7× Lemon Yellow +1× Phthalo Blue
This palette cannot quite reach that color with 3 pigments in one mixture. What you see is the closest it gets, which is worth knowing before you spend an afternoon trying.
Warm gray #9B9086
For stone, plaster and anything in warm light.
6× Titanium White +2× Ultramarine +1× Burnt Umber
8× Yellow Ochre +3× Titanium White +3× Ultramarine
This palette cannot quite reach that color with 3 pigments in one mixture. What you see is the closest it gets, which is worth knowing before you spend an afternoon trying.
7× Ultramarine +3× Burnt Umber
Very thin wash, roughly 1 part paint to 14 parts water.
4× Lemon Yellow +1× Ultramarine
This palette cannot quite reach that color with 3 pigments in one mixture. What you see is the closest it gets, which is worth knowing before you spend an afternoon trying.
Cool gray #87909B
For shadow on a white object under daylight.
10× Titanium White +7× Ultramarine +1× Burnt Umber
10× Ultramarine +9× Titanium White +2× Yellow Ochre
This palette cannot quite reach that color with 3 pigments in one mixture. What you see is the closest it gets, which is worth knowing before you spend an afternoon trying.
9× Ultramarine +3× Burnt Sienna +1× Yellow Ochre
Very thin wash, roughly 1 part paint to 8 parts water.
9× Ultramarine +8× Titanium White +2× Lemon Yellow
This palette cannot quite reach that color with 3 pigments in one mixture. What you see is the closest it gets, which is worth knowing before you spend an afternoon trying.
Deep neutral dark #3B3A38
Darker than most people dare mix without reaching for black.
10× Titanium White +8× Ivory Black +3× Phthalo Blue
7× Ultramarine +4× Yellow Ochre
6× Payne’s Gray +5× Burnt Sienna +1× Burnt Umber
Full wash.
7× Phthalo Blue +2× Cadmium Yellow Light
Worth remembering
- Start from the color you want the gray to belong to, then add its opposite a little at a time. Going the other way — starting from gray and adding color — almost always overshoots.
- If your gray looks muddy rather than quiet, it usually has three or more pigments in it. Two is enough.
- A gray next to a saturated color will look tinted in the opposite direction. Judge it in place, not on the palette.
Your paints, your photo
These mixtures assume the palettes above. Tick off what you actually own and pick the color straight out of your reference instead.