values
are the backbone of successful paintings
It’s fun painting with colors, but values are what make successful paintings. They are what make a painting sing!
Value is the light
and darkness of colors. Use them to create strong,
attractive paintings.
what are values in painting?
It is the variation of the light and darkness of colors. Some colors are lighter. Some colors are darker and many fall in between.
Someone devised a scale with nine parts. White is on one end and black is on the other end of the scale. Variations of gray fall in between the white and black.
using values of your painting
I like to divide a painting into about three different parts, foreground, middle ground, and background.
When you are planning your paintings, concentrate on getting three different tones into the painting.
Good composition says to vary the size of the elements of your painting. Repetition is boring, so make each part a different size.
Each part
will also be a different tone; light, medium or dark.
The dark elephant is the
largest. The light background is the medium size. The foreground with
the medium tones is the smallest area.
The Elements Are Different Sizeslearning to see
What if our paintings were all the same tone? They would look very flat. Without a difference between lights and darks, we could not see any of forms in a painting.
In order to see the lights and darks, squint your eyes and look. All the
details will disappear and you will see only the light and dark tones.
We ladies don't need any squint lines, so we just lower our eyelids.
Look at the left image. Do you see the lights and darks? You may see it better in the gray-scale image.
Squint your eyes and look.
Did you see this?practice seeing
Lower your eyelids and look at the things around your room. Notice the light and darkness of different things in your room. Train your eyes to see the light and darkness of the things around you.
Look when you are going down the road - as a passenger of course. Things will suddenly become more alive as you.
Duplicate what you see into your paintings. It is lots of fun.
what do we see in nature?
In nature things get lighter in the distance. This is called aerial perspective.
Particles in the air reflect light, thus making the distant objects appear lighter.
On a very clear day you can see farther because there are fewer particles in the air.
In the painting at the right the mountains in the background are much lighter than the foreground.
Aerial perspective is doing its job and we artists duplicate it in our paintings by adjusting the tones.
We paint the aerial perspective by adjusting the tones.the value of colors
Different colors reflect or absorb more or less light. Yellow reflects the most light of any color. The light bounces back off the color into our eyes. This makes the color look lighter to us.
Purple is the darkest color. It adsorbs most of the light rays. Very little light bounces back to our eyes. So the color looks very dark to us.
There is no rule that says a person has to paint something its actual natural color. A painting will work as long as we use light against dark.
Dolphins are actually gray. Plain old gray is boring to me. I painted these dolphins pink and purple instead.
Grey-scale showing the light and dark colors.painting with values
The focal area is the place to use your lightest lights and your darkest darks. The strong contrast of lights and darks automatically draws the eye to that area.
We also use more saturated colors in the focal area.
Use the highest contrast in the focal area.
See the contrast in the grey-scale.The high contrast between the bright, light wall of the back barn and the dark doorway draw the viewer into the painting.
The contrast along with more saturated colors draws the viewer's eyes to the focal area.
As much as I love color, a painting must have good contrast and a variety of values to be successful.
You can do it! Have fun painting!
more pages for your interest
What's New
-
Original Paintings on Sale for the Holidays
Nov 23, 18 07:54 AM
Awesome Holiday Sale of Original Painting by Carol May Fifteen original paintings are on sale. Each original painting is priced under $100 with the shipping included.
-
Glazing with Watercolor
Nov 20, 18 10:44 AM
Glazing with watercolor is where a transparent wash of color is painted over a previous dry layer of paint. The viewer sees both layers of paint and their eye visually mixes the color. Glazing produ…
-
What Did That Artist Say?
Nov 19, 18 03:20 PM
What did that artist say? What did they mean? This artist glossary has painting terms commonly used by artists. Included are the art definitions of what these terms mean.
-
How To Mix Paint Colors
Nov 10, 18 07:36 PM
Make your paintings sing when you know how to mix paint colors. The color wheel is your key to understanding how to use paint colors. Mix warm colors, cool colors, greens and your own blacks with ease…
-
How To Choose Painting Colors for your individual paintings
Nov 09, 18 09:44 AM
How do the professionals choose colors for their paintings? What colors will look best in your paintings? Learn how to choose painting colors. You can create beautiful, harmonious paintings with only…