I’ve been working on a complex illustration in Illustrator CC 2023 and decided to use the Gradient Mesh tool to add subtle shading to a character’s face. However, whenever I add new mesh points or adjust the colors at specific points, the colors shift dramatically and create harsh, unnatural transitions instead of smooth gradients. This problem happens even when I use similar colors and try to keep the adjustments minimal.

I’ve checked the mesh settings, and I’m using the default options. I also tried toggling the GPU preview and CPU preview modes under View > Preview on GPU to see if rendering affected the colors, but the issue persists. Has anyone else experienced this kind of behavior with the Gradient Mesh tool recently? Are there any tips or best practices for maintaining smooth color transitions when editing mesh points, especially in CC 2023? I’m worried I might be missing a workflow step or a setting that causes Illustrator to interpret the mesh colors incorrectly.