On my watercolor discord, I joked that an “evil primary triad” would be Hansa Yellow Light, Pyrrol Red, and Ultramarine Blue. In most triads, you optimize for vibrance in one area while sacrificing it in another; in this triad, although the primary colors themselves are bright, all the secondaries – oranges, greens, and violets – would be muted and dull.
Of course everyone then got invested in proving me wrong and painting gorgeously with this (actually fairly traditional) triad.
I couldn’t exactly join in because I do not have Hansa Yellow Light or Pyrrol Red at this time – there’s a reason I added them to my “evil triad,” because I don’t particularly like them – but I did my best to approximate it them with my lemon yellow (Azo Yellow) and middle red (Perylene Red). Of course, I chose those paints because I think they mix well, so this isn’t a great approximation of the “evil triad.” Still, I found that I enjoyed this triad more than I ever thought I would a traditional red/yellow/blue.
Color Wheel
As I suspected, all the secondaries are somewhat muted – at least more so than you’d intuitively expect from the vibrance of the triad. Still, they’re not ugly! They are nice muted.
Pairwise Color Mixes
Azo Yellow + Perylene Red
Not so much vibrant oranges as peachy, ruby-red-grapefruit to gold colors.
Azo Yellow + Ultramarine Blue
Rather than vibrant “greeny” greens, these make more misty, muted teals.
Ultramarine Blue + Perylene Red
I originally swatched this for Mixing Mauve for Watercolor Clouds, and I really liked how this mix can make interesting, granulating, muted violets that look like stormclouds or blue hills through atmospheric perspective. I also really value its dark mixes. I think the ability to mix darks is one of the most crucial aspects of a good triad.
Painting
Given the great colors for fall leaves and atmospheric hills, I looked for a somewhat muted Blue Ridge scene on Unsplash.
Here’s my painting with the triad.
Conclusion
I have to acknowledge that I kind of like the “evil triad”! Okay, so maybe it’s more like a traditional triad. I’m coming to appreciate muted and dark colors more so than the most vibrant colors, and I think this a more usable triad than, say, all pastels. Still, I do kinda miss a rose/magenta and cyan!