Usually we do cross-brand paint reviews on Paint List but today we're going to zoom out an give you an overview of how a pigment is used in oil paints. If you're a long-time painter you already know that pigments are one of the keys to unlocking the world of paint. Tubes of paint should include pigment codes on the back of the tube that tell you what they're made of-- this is important for understanding toxicity, lightfastness and other properties of the paint. Even clues to how the color will behave in mixes can be decoded this way, as pigments have patterns in the way they work on the palette. There are a lot of good resources out there for studying dry pigments, and so we're going to focus on how this pigment is used in oil painting: areas of the gamut where it's helpful, notes on mixes, how it compares to similar pigments, and also how it tends to be used by paintmakers in blends.

Today we're looking at Pyrrole Red PR254. Pyrrole Red is somewhere between semi-transparent and very transparent depending on the brand. PR254 is a cool red- meaning it is less orange than Cadmium Red Light. However Pyrrole Red PR254 is "redder" than most magentas and crimsons- PR254 is close to what some would imagine as a 'primary red' though that is an imperfect theoretical concept. Drying time can vary enormously from brand to brand. We'll be comparing Pyrrole Red to Cadmium Reds, some of which may have a similar hue in masstone.

When working on a large color mixing project, I tubed over a thousand precision-matched mixes, and I found myself reaching for full strength Pyrrole Red in masstone to match one of the highest chroma red colors. Pyrrole Red PR254 shows a different mixing behavior than Cadmium Red Medium in tints, as well an ever so slightly different masstone, and the two have different opacities. PR254 is a terrific red-- not a perfect replacement for any other pigment-- but then again, no other pigment seemed to perfectly replace it.

From bottom to top, we start with the closest complement,Viridian PG18. For this we used Michael Harding's, though there is not a lot of variety in hue among premium brands. This made a far better complementary blend than the related Phthalo GreenPG7, which was a bit more chromatic and didn't grey out as well.

Next we have a swatch of Cadmium Red by Michael Harding, (more on cadmium comparisons with Pyrrole Below). We were surprised how similar this cadmium was was to Pyrrole Red, though the tints were a little warmer.

Next we have three Pyrrole Reds (M. Graham, Williamsburg, and Vasari. The small dollops of bright pink set alongside these show the a cooler pink: Quinacridone Magenta PR122, also by Michael Harding. PR122 is included to show that even though Pyrrole Red is cool, it's not nearly as cool as Quinacridone Magenta.

The Vasari PR254 bears special mention because it was significantly warmer than other Pyrrole Reds we've tried. As a side note, Vasari actually offers two PR254 paints. Vasari's Permanent Red Bright PR254 was quite similar to Pyrrole Scarlet, which has a different pigment, PR255, which is shown next to it- this one is Scarlet Lake by Winsor and Newton.

Lastly, we show Pyrrole Red PR254 deepened with several Quinacridones. Quinacridone Rose PV19 by Michael Harding, Quinacridone Magenta PR122 by Michael Harding and Permanent Magenta, a different PV19 Violet, by Winsor and Newton. These are just a few of many ways Pyrrole Red can be deepened. All tints are made with Williamsburg Titanium White.

When talking about Pyrrole Red, everything is contextual, so let's look at where its tints fall in the progression from red to orange. Tints with Titanium White bring out different qualities in a pigment, so we swatched quite a few and arranged them in spectrum order in the Great Book of Color. Both PR254 and PR255 are indispensable for tints and it can be very handy to have both colors if you want to make pastel pinks. Generally PR254 is cooler, however there is one exception which we'll talk about later regarding Vasari. Generally speaking, PR255 is oranger and will also make more coral tints where PR254 makes a bit pinker/redder tints.

From PR254 we can also go the opposite direction to delve into cooler pinks with a handful of quinacridones (e.g. PR209, PV19 rose, and PR122). When it comes to making bright pink-purples, a quinacridone magenta would be a better choice than PR254.

Overall PR254 Pyrrole Red is good choice for middle reds. It is more lightfast than PR112--as beautiful as that color is--Pyrrole Red is also less reactive, so Pyrrole Red would be our choice for middle-red tints.

When using this color in the color mixing project, I got to know it as quite disctinct from some of the cadmium colors, such that using one to replace another wouldn't occur to me. There is a clear and cool note to Pyrrole. Until mixing a color system with color targets I had not realized what a zoo the reds are when it comes to color mixing. Titanium white tends to spin reds blue, and so adding titanium white to a color will tend to spin the hue into another color's territory. More explanation is needed here which goes beyond this article. In regards to Pyrrole specifically, it was interesting to see the way paintmakers used this in blends as it paralleled some of my own color mixing research. I often found myself deepening and modifying Pyrrole Red PR254 to make some adjacent low notes in the reds and magentas. Incorporating quinacridones, crimsons, and some quinacridone violet were natural ways of migrating this color from its star role as "brightest red" into lower notes.

Also there were a few places where I needed to modulate this color ever so slightly oranger by mixing it with its cousin color, PR255. As an aside, PR255 is harder to find as a single-pigment paint. Pyrrole Red also has a role as a complement in mixes with Viridian and Phthalo Green Blue Shade (PG7), though of the two Viridian was nearer to grey.

The short answer is maybe. Not really--but kinda. There are a few issues in terms of hue and even bigger issues with opacity, as Pyrrole is less opaque than the high quality cadmiums.

Pyrrole is by no means the only pigment used in efforts to replace Cadmium Red, which tells us that there is not a unanimous vote among paintmakers as to which pigment is best at trying to replace Cadmium Red in terms of color and behavior-- and a sort of hint that perhaps none of the contenders are overwhelmingly satisfactory. However in applications where moisture is involved to any degree Pyrrole has the advantage of being more weatherfast (both colors are lightfast, but weatherfastness also encompasses moisture, and Cadmium Red is more vulnerable to moisture).

In general, from a color perspective we really don't love hue approximations. For those newer to painting, when a color is labeled "hue" it means that it is using pigments that are less expensive to approximate a more expensive color. So usually we steer clear of these blends as mixes are less ideal in a lot of ways and rarely does the Hue do a satisfactory job of fully replacing the original pigment.

Pyrrole Red and Cadmium Red are indeed different- however out of all the attempts at cadmium replacements, it seems that Pyrrole may come closest to Cadmium Red Medium, depending which particular Cadmium Red Medium we're talking about since there a huge variety of cadmium colors from brand to brand.

As an aside, another color PR112 (Napthol Red) is a popular choice for approximating cadmiums as well, but PR112 doesn't have the same lightfastness as Pyrrole and can also be a bit reactive in different mixing whites (see Golden's recent lightfastness testing). Both Pyrrole Red and Cadmium Red Medium tend to have good lightfastness, so that's a vote for Pyrrole over Napthol in general.

In comparine Pyrroles to Cadmium Red Mediums, though we noticed differences, Pyrrole Red PR254 seemed most similar in masstone to Michael Harding's Cadmium Red or Old Holland's Cadmium Red Vermillioned. Williamsburg's Cadmium Red Medium was also very close. (Bear in mind when making this comparison, we're talking about the standard cool-red Pyrrole Reds made with PR254, not the slightly warmer version of the pigment used by Vasari). Also, as we mentioned before Pyrrole tends toward more transparency or semi-transparency where high quality Cadmium Reds will be more opaque.

In our experience, in order to achieve similar results to Cadmium Red when using Pyrrole, a few more colors may need to be added to soften the Pyrrole's high chroma, which is doable, however the two pigments feel different in practice.

The range of Cadmium Reds is huge and the term "cadmium red" encompasses quite a few colors from brand to brand-- these include deep reds to bright primary-esque reds to red-oranges. Pyrrole does a better job of approximating some cadmium reds in masstone than others. In order to approximate Cadmium Red, Pyrrole Red may require a few more colors-- as evidenced by some of the blends listed on the tubes of hues made with Pyrrole (e.g. paintmakers often add PO73, PY184, PR101, or PR112 depending on the manufacturer).

Here's a comparison from Williamsburg on Pyrrole Red vs. Cadmium Red.

We also mixed M Graham Pyrrol Red and Williamsburg Cadmium Red with a yellow, in this case Old Holland Scheveningen Yellow Lemon, and we noticed the difference in the two pigments. It's hard to articulate precisely but the Pyrrol retained a bit more pink while the Cadmium Red, which had a similar masstone to the Pyrrol, warmed more readily.

As a brief note on paint blends labeled 'Cadmium Red Hue'-it's helpful to pay attention to the pigment content. In one case, expensive cadmium is merely cut with the less-costly Pyrrole. Many of these cadmium approximations incorporate a handful of pigments to try to achieve similar results to a cadmium red- sometimes using as many as four pigments.

We found ourselves describing this red as "rich, cool, and powerful," which is pretty much the image that Ferrari goes for, too. Though of course we mean rich in terms of saturation, cool in terms of leaning not so orangey as far as reds go, and powerful in terms of tinting strength. This red is super high chroma, lightfast, and yes, it is actually used on Ferraris. Based on DPP, Diketo-pyrrolo pyrrole red, is a fairly recently-invented pigment, and yet it seems to stand up well in terms of lightfastness (Kremer gives theirs an 8/8/8 on the blue wool scale which equates to top marks). This high-performance color was actually used on Ferrari's in the early 2000's. (More info here). So with an endorsement like that, it's no wonder we keep it on our palettes.