Magenta is a smooth, luxurious, and somewhat mysterious color. It brings such beauty to interior designs that you may often find people asking: “how to make magenta paint”.
First of all, magenta can be a tricky-to-make color, and some may say that you cannot make the perfect shade of magenta at all by mixing colors. We can’t just laugh off their theory because, in color printing, magenta is considered a primary color.
You can achieve a shade of magenta by mixing a certain amount of Red and Blue or mixing a little bit of Alizarin Crimson or Crimson Lake with Purple in acrylic color mixing.
In this article, we are going to discuss more magenta facts and learn how to create magenta in different mediums. So, let’s dive into our main topic.
What Is Magenta – Some Closer Colors to Magenta
The color magenta can be described in many ways, some may define it to be a purplish-red color while others may consider it to be a mauvish-crimson color. But no matter what people call it, we all have to admit that it’s a real luxurious color.
The word magenta came from an aniline dye that dates back to 1859 when a French chemist named François-Emmanuel Verguin first made and patented it. One amazing fact about magenta is that at first, he named it fuchsine. It was later renamed magenta to celebrate the victory of the Italian-French side at the battle of Magenta which was fought between the Austrians and French.
The shades that are close to magenta may vary from person to person. Some would say that it is close to purple and some may say that it has a pinkish purple look. The fun fact is that in both additive and subtractive color models, you will find magenta sitting exactly in the middle of blue and red.
Also Read: Using Water Based Paint Over Oil Based Primer
What Colors Make Magenta?
Before answering this question, let’s revise some chapters from elementary school color theory. Can you remember that the primary colors were Red, Yellow, and Blue and secondary colors were Purple, Orange, and Green? Did you notice magenta anywhere?
No, right? That’s because what you learned in elementary school was based on the RYB color model which comes from the traditional Red, Yellow, and Blue based painting. However, there are other color models like CMYK or RGB where magenta has a significant impact. Let’s discuss them briefly.
CMYK (Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, Black)
The name of this model is self-explanatory, you can see that magenta is one of the base colors of this model. And the CMYK color model is widely used in the printing industry like printing newspapers, magazines, etc. The same model is used in your office printers. So, if you are working with a CMYK model, you don’t need to mix any additional colors to make the magenta color.
RGB (Red, Green, Blue)
This color model is widely used to visualize things in the screens that we use daily, like TVs, Smartphone, computer monitors, etc. In this model, we can make a magenta color by mixing two colors and the colors are red and blue.
But when we are talking about traditional paint mixing, you may try to mix red and blue to get the magenta color, but I think you will end up with something violet, not magenta. That’s why we said that it’s a tricky-to-make color in the beginning.
However, you can achieve a nice-looking shade of magenta if you do acrylic color mixing and use Purple with Alizarin Crimson or Crimson Lake. And you may use blue and red to make magenta but the shade may not be an accurate one which we said earlier.
What Two Colors Make Magenta?
Probably you have already got some ideas about the two colors that make magenta. When we are talking about the RGB color model, you can mix red and blue to make the magenta color.
However, also in acrylic paint mixing, you can achieve a nice fuchsia color using red and blue but you need to add some other colors as well. Fuchsia is the identical twin of magenta. But the problem is that the rule for making magenta with two colors will be omitted then.
How to Make Magenta Paint – Step by Step
Using acrylic color mixing techniques, you can make magenta color in several ways. The shades may not be 100% accurate but they are worth giving a try. And probably the easiest way to make magenta would be using two primary colors: red and blue. And there are more methods as well. So, let’s take a look.
Red and Blue:
- Step 1: Taking the Paint
Take some red paint in a container. Add the same amount of blue. The overall amount of the colors will depend on the amount of magenta you want, but make sure you take 50-50 of each color while mixing.
Using cobalt blue and cadmium red is recommended but any red and blue that isn’t extremely dark or extremely light should do the job.
- Step 2: Mixing
Mix the colors using a brush or a stirring stick. Keep mixing until you see no streaks remaining.
- Step 3: Adjusting the Color
You may not feel satisfied with the color you got in the first shot. No worries. You can always adjust the shade of the color by adding a little bit of color from the red or the blue to get your desired shade.
If you feel you’ve added too much red, you can use blue to fix everything, and if the blue seems to be the dominating color, use red to bring back the balance.
Purple with Alizarin Crimson or Crimson Lake:
- Step 1: Taking The Paint
Take some purple paint in a container. Next, add a little amount of alizarin crimson or crimson lake color.
- Step 2: Mixing
Mix the colors well using a brush or a stirring stick. You will get your desired magenta shade.
- Step 3: Adjusting the Color
If the resultant color needs a little bit of adjustment and you feel like you’ve added too much purple you can use a slight amount of alizarin crimson or crimson lake color to fix everything and if the crimson color seems dominating, use purple to bring back the balance.
Remember, you need to use more purple than crimson color to achieve a nice shade of magenta.
How to Make Magenta with Acrylic Paint
Making magenta with acrylic paint is quite simple, you don’t need to go through tricky color mixing theories here. All you need is some clear acrylic gesso and some magenta pigment.
- First, take some clear gesso in a container and add magenta pigment to it. Now mix them using a stirring stick or a paintbrush. Keep mixing until no streaks remain and you will see your desired magenta color.
- If you don’t have clear gesso, you may use white gesso however, sticking to clear gesso is always recommended. Though it will be okay to make magenta paint with white gesso, it will cost you more magenta pigment and more mixing time to achieve your desired magenta shade.
How to Make Magenta with Oil Paint
This one is as simple as working with acrylic paint. You can make magenta with oil paint using some magenta pigment and a good oil medium. For an oil medium, linseed oil is always recommended. It works great with pigments.
So, to begin making magenta paint, first take some linseed oil. You can take a small amount first to check how it works and then make larger batches according to your need. Okay, add some magenta pigment to the linseed oil now. Finally, mix them well and you should get your desired magenta paint.
If you don’t find the exact color you are looking for, try changing the amount of the pigment or the oil medium depending on the condition of the shade. Additionally, if you find oil paint mixing a little tricky, there are magenta oil paint tubes available in the market, you can check them out.
How to Make Magenta with Watercolor Paint
To make the magenta color with watercolor, you need to use some magenta pigment and a proper medium. When we are talking about the medium, using gum arabic is recommended. But if you find other mediums suitable, you may give them a try as well.
To begin the magenta-making process, take some gum arabic and add some magenta pigments to it. Mix them well and your magenta paint will be ready.
How to Make Magenta without Red?
Making magenta without a red color may be a difficult thing unless you consider crimson to be a true red color! If you use a little amount of alizarin crimson or crimson lake color with purple color and mix them, you will find a nice shade of magenta.
How to Make Bright Magenta Paint?
If you make magenta paint brighter, the resultant color will look something like a red-heavy purple color or purplish-pink color.
Anyway, to brighten magenta paint, you need to mix some bright shaded cool red color with a little bit of white. You will get bright pink as a result. Now, add a little amount of blue or purple paint to achieve your desired bright magenta color.
If you don’t find the shade to be satisfactory, try experimenting with the shade of the red color and other colors as well.
How to Make Darken Magenta Paint?
You can make magenta paint look darker in multiple ways. You can choose black or green to easily darken magenta paint.
You may wonder how green works to darken magenta paint! Well, it works because if you look at the color wheel, you will find that green sits opposite to the magenta color. So, being an opposite color of magenta, it darkens the magenta color as a result.
An important point to notice while working with black or green color is that you may mess up the whole magenta color if the amount of black or green is used more than needed.
So, to successfully darken the magenta paint, always add the black or green color in a small amount at a time. Gradually changing the amount will allow you to achieve a nice, dark-looking magenta color.
Magenta in Design
Magenta has various uses. Besides regular home designs or upholstery designs, it can be used on instances such as:
- Printing: You can’t even think of printing without the CMYK color model. So, magenta plays a very important role here.
- Home décor: Magenta is a great color for home decor and interior designs.
- DIY projects: Magenta can be an excellent choice for certain DIY projects like fabric dying or upholstery fabric designs.
- Car painting: You can make your car look dashing by covering it with a nice magenta shade.
- Graphic design: Magenta can be a top choice for graphic designers.
- Beauty industry: The beauty industry uses magenta in a huge amount.
Magenta is a luxurious and smooth color that adds richness to any surface. Using a nice shade of magenta can instantly make a dull surface look gorgeous.
Final Thoughts
Magenta is such an amazing color that suits almost everything, from interior walls to automobiles. Besides being an amazing color, it can be considered as a mysterious color because some may consider it to be a primary color thus it can’t be made by mixing other colors, while others believe that making magenta by mixing colors is possible.
We respect both opinions but in our article, we’ve shown that it’s possible to make magenta color in various mediums. Though you may not get the 100% accurate shade of magenta, using these techniques to make magenta is worth it. So, don’t stop your creative hands if you need a little bit of magenta to make your work look perfect.
