Several people have asked me to offer a class about how I paint with acrylics, and most of those people are primarily impressed with how I use color. Today, I have begun putting that class together, and my first step is to show you most of the Golden acrylic paint colors and how I group them. The complete chart is at the bottom of this post.

Yellows – I am showing these colors from a lemony yellow to a dark pumpkin squash yellow. On the second part of the above chart, you will see how those colors react when mixed both with water and with white paint. The middle swatch is the paint at full strength. The top two swatches are mixed with varying solutions of water. The bottom two swatches are mixed with varying amounts of white paint. I use Titanium white.

Some reds are more orange, and some blues are more nearly purple. If you hope to keep your colors clean and bright, you need to become aware of that fact. I’ll explain more about that in another post.

Some blues are more nearly red or purple, and some blues are more nearly turquoise or green. 

It is a myth to believe that all blues and all yellows make greens. To make clear, bright greens, you must mix blues that are more turquoise-like.  However, the more natural olive greens are intentional violations of that rule. I’ll explain that better later.

Notice that both aureolin and nickel azo are clearer, more transparent colors than yellow ochre, which tends to be opaque.