I have much trouble with dying my fondant or even buttercream black or red. With the fondant I can never get it to the right color, and with the buttercream, it loses it's consistancy the more color I add. Please Help!!

What kind of food coloring are you using?

I gave up and bought an airbrush machine. The best investment I ever made!

I've had great success using Americolor!

I am amazed still sometimes how much color it takes to get it to black or nice red sometimes. Even when added more doesn't seem to be doing anything, keep adding for awhile. And be sure to use a gel color to help with the consistency issue, if that's not what you are already using. There's an article out there somewhere about how to get deep colors in your fondant by adding cornstarch (I think). I've never actually tried it, I've always been able to get the colors I wanted without it, (so far) but maybe someone on here knows where you can find that article.

I usually just buy those colours. They are really hard to create.

Americolor Super Red and Super Black gel colors. they are super strong so you don't use nearly as much coloring so no icky chemical taste either! and let your red bc or fondant sit overnight, the color will deepen!

Ditto on Americolor - I recently switched from Wiltons and I could not be happier. The colours are deeper and you use much less and as SarahL said if you let it sit over night the colour will deepen.

I agree on the americolors. I also usually start off using blue or purple fondant then add black or with red I start of using orange and brown then add red. Add a touch of blue to red fondant to give the red fondant a deeper color. Just a touch though or you will end up with purple. Do let your colors sit for a few hours and they will deepen in color.

I have been using Americolor soft gel paste. It still seems really hard. Does anyone know if using the powdered colors helps any? I would buy the fondant that has already been dyed, but it's not available in my area, and shipping is expensive when I buy online on Global Sugar Art. The shipping costs more than the actual product.

Have you tried country kitchen sweetart? I don't buy pre-made fondant or frostings but their prices are really reasonable on everything else ...and so is their shipping (along with being extremely quick). Maybe check them out? I get really true reds and black with my americolor "supers" but everyone has their own tricks.... What works for some doesn't always work for others....

As has been said, Wilton black or red is terrible. You have to use far too much to get the proper colour, plus wilton black tends to turn BC runny and/or grainy.
Americolor is the way to go. Spectrum & Chefmaster are good also, but Americolour is more readily available. One trick I learned a long time ago for a great black buttercream, was to add black color to chocolate buttercream. It works great, and takes half the amount of black you'd use starting with a white BC.

The only drawback of adding black to chocolate of course, is your client not wanting, or liking, a chocolate flavour.
As for fondant, Americolor recommended again, but, buying black and red fondant allready made, is even better!

I'd recommend Lucks liqua-gel colors in super red and coal black. They have no taste or smell. I've always been able to get a black black and a red red in buttercream, fondant, gumpaste and cake batter. You can buy direct from lucks . com at a wholesale price with no minimum order, if you have a business. Otherwise, you'd have to order through a distributor.

I also buy the fondant in these colors.

I simply refuse to use a base color of red or black buttercream on a cake. Adding that much color of any brand makes the icing bitter and gives it a bad consistency. I use Americolor to make small amounts of red or black fondant, but if it's for the base of the cake it's much better to just buy precolored fondant.

Precolored fondant.

I sometimes have wondered if I could start with candy clay using this method. But I haven't tried it yet. Or I've wondered if I could mix MMF with the other fondant and start with pink already, but yummy pink.

http://sugarsweetcakesandtreats.blogspot.com/2010/11/recipe-red-marshmallow-fondant-mmf.html

Angela uses MMF a lot, if not all the time. She also used to color it with Strawberry Jell-O, to start with a pink base and then she added red.

Of course I've just bought the pre-colored fondant, but I still want to have options for whenever I don't have the pre-colored one. I think I read somewhere here another poster who buys tons of the black candy melts from Wilton around Halloween, I think they have them at the Wilton site all year round now.

http://cakecentral.com/gallery/1537867

Good quality Airbrush is worth every penny.

Love my new airbrush for those hard to get colors!!

Check out Edna's "coloring gumpaste" tutorial. http://designmeacake.com/id69.html. I always just buy red & black myself but I'm going to start experimenting with dying homemade.

I like to make modeling chocolate in that color I need and then mix 50/50 with white fondant and it colors real nice, and works nice too

When making MMF I use a powdered food coloring from local cake store. It still takes a lot of black to make black but it doesn't have the bitter taste that the gel colors have. It's pretty easy, I just blend it in with the dry fondant ingredients before I mix in the marshmallow mixture. A lot less kneading that way.