Scalecolor: Thin Red Line

Six reds and near-reds from the Scalecolor range: Primary Red and Orange on the warm side, Magenta, Purple and Dark Violet on the cool side, with Red Ochre grounding the lot.

The selection encodes the right way to paint red - shadows down through purple and violet, highlights up through orange - rather than the black-and-white route that kills red's saturation.

£3.45 per bottle in Scale75's dead-matt display formula.

Best for: rich red cloaks and armour shaded through purple instead of black.