[ceenda]

"And the prize for the most obscure question of 2003 goes to..."

Hmn. One of the things I notice about good digital pieces is that the artists don't stick to the same colours for long amounts of time. I'm sure spooge_demon is probably tired of being quoted on every second thread over here , but this piece in particular kinda points out quite clearly what I've seen from pics by people like spooge, Flushgarden, henrik, janne, beat etc. to quote but a few.

1) On the cutlass and the shirt I can make out at least 8 different colours, even though the shirt is just white. How do you know which colours to use? Are they just different hues of the same intensity? It is just intuition?

I guess this comes from having a good painting background, but I have real trouble just trying not to draw grass as just "green" and skies as just "blue. I just wonder how the whole varying colour thing works? It defies my logical brain...

[Gothic Gerbil]

Well I'll be replying from a oil painting background since I haven't touched my wacom for a good while. For me, varying colours is just a way of breaking up the monotony of monochrome. Ick, that is such an ugly phrase, "monotony of monochrome." When deciding what colour to add to vary I think more in terms of temperature than in hue. Perhaps a dash of yellow to warm up my otherwise cool light blue, or a cool red to cool down a warm green. I make no claims at being perfect about it, but to me it just seems to be something that will eventually come naturally with practise. Also, if what I've put down isn't coming across as exactly what I want, that is ok, I leave it and will paint over it with something else, yet some of it will still show through in areas if I like, especially if painting transparently. Actually, painting transparently is likely the key to such things. Such as looking at spooge's painting that you linked, a lot of those colour variations looked glazed in, such as a number of the violets and yellows in the sleeves.

Mmm, ok, I guess the summary of this is just think different, green isn't always green when it is green. I guess that is my sage wisdom for the day!
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[MadSamoan]

I would say in the case of that particular piece, it's a metal surface and it's reflecting colors from the environment around it. Look at the sword colors and look at the deck, the sails, etc. It's most obvious in metal surfaces, but it applies to painting just about any kind of surface in general.

[Les Watters]

Charles Hawthorn says, "Never paint more than three inches without changing colors"

Now that means you change the color by value or by saturation.

Not switching to a contrasting color, though you could do that as well. Read Hawthorn on Painting.


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Wally Wood

[Probustion]

this might be a bit off topic but it slipped my mind:

Loomis in his book succesful illustration says that you shouldn't use more than 4 base values in a painting. since value is color, what does he mean by that?
you shouldn't use more than 4 values but as many colors as you can think of?

not saying it is true or not true what he says but these are things that really confuse me. it's even hard to explain what i mean, as you can see...
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[Torstein Nordstrand]

I can't remember that specific Loomis passage, but Value is NOT the same as Colour. Value is greyscale. So 4 levels of Value is 4 different states of grey. Basically, he doesn't want you to smudge and shade everything - limit the levels of grey - to four.
When talking about paint, there are usually three distinct terms and properties:

Hue=Colour - reddish, greenish, bluish, etc
Value=brightness - light and dark
Saturation=Intensity of colour - Brilliance or dullness of colour

In Photoshop you can change the colour palette to "HSV slider", which is an abbereviation of the three terms explained above. I personally find it much more useful than the standard one.
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[Lunatique]

I've wondered about the same thing for a while now. It appears that it's really just instinctive--since I see no logical reason for some of the color choices in the variations--but somehow, it ends up all in harmony and looking beautiful. But at the same time, I've seen many works that keeps a fairly pure color palette on the canvas, but still looks vibrant and lively--in those cases it's more about the brush work usually.

[spooge demon]

There can be a logical reason, or it can be arbitrary or even just design/decorative. As long as you get the value right, you can't go far wrong with any color or saturation. Ceenda, the green grass problem is a good one. Look at real grass, yes it is green but there are a million variations and a lot of it is dead, which is brown (not really a color, but a dark orange red) So these compliments of strong local color bounce in the eye like a Monet creating the richness that I think you are after. Also, the transparency of plants gives a bright yellow green when backlit in strong sunlight. The surfaces are also a little reflective, so the pick up a cool bluish tone when light from the same side as the viewer and especially is they are facing upwards towards a clear sky. So there you have a rationale for doing more than reaching for the grass green.

Here is a cube with arbitrary color thrown in, with no system at all, simply to show that the color does not make things read.



But some thing is not quite right. I doubt a client would buy it if you gave them this lecture after making your grass purple. So start with just varying your color while keeping the values correct, seeing what looks more natural than not. Then start looking around at stuff and noticing the color information that you see, and try to explain why it is there. This will help you remember it later. So it is a little like anatomy, just have to persevere and learn it over time.

Here is something I posted a while ago, could not find the thread, so I paste it here:


This is an exercise that was part of a color theory class at Art Center. The teacher was Judy Crook. The two small studies are tiny and done a long time ago that is why they are a bit crude.

The idea, if I remember, was to take a photo of some complex outdoor architecture and do three studies-

The first is to use correct values, but make the colors arbitrary. There should be no color dominance in any area. This is an exercise to make the mind separate value and color.

The second and third follow these general ideas:

After the cool night, a lot of moisture is in the air, like being under water almost. The sunlight is shifted a little cooler, greener and yellower. After the sun creates wind and heats up the land, the moisture burns away and dust is picked up and blown around. A sunset is warmer and a bit less diffuse. The arm cool contrast of light and shadow is a bit more pronounced.


So the second study is cool light, warm shadow. The colors and values are softer, and the warm/cool difference is a little more muted. But the relative difference is definitely there. And it is not something that should be brutally followed, as you can see there are breaks in the formula. If it were followed to closely, it would look cartoonish.

The third is warm light, cool shadow, more like afternoon into evening. Again, it is not a formula that will guide every last color choice, as what determines color is a million different little mechanisms. But it is a general starting point.


1


2


3

[merlyns]

okay this thread is in my bookmark now

-david
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[SilentBrain]

This is information I've been looking for desperately for a while now. :) Thank you thank you thank you!

[henrik]

In addition to what's been said here already, study the color wheel, try to work with complimentary colors. As spooge already points out, look around you and try and think of light as warm and cool. Tree trunks are a good example. Sketch a tree, push your colors warm/cool while retaining it's correct value and structure. Start by changingyour colors slightly to understand their effects. You'll be surprised how cool grey looks next to warm colors and vice versa. As for Torstein's advice on the HSB sliders; bear in mind that changing saturation changes the value, so you might want to check the value too.
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[Probustion]

thanks for that info spooge, that helps alot.

Torstein Nordstrand: i said it wrong, my bad. i know value isn't exactly the same as color, but am i right if i say every combination of HSB has a value? so a bright fully saturated yellow has a high value and a bright fully saturated purple a low one, right?

something else i was wondering: it's a fact that darkness takes away the color of an object, as we can see when it's night, very little color is visible(i believe that has to do with the cones in the eye).
but when i look at most (digital) paintings i can see a color contains more saturation in the dark places than in the light. is often seems to run in a curve - from light and dull to dark and brilliant, with some tweaks here and there. i'm doing this myself too, but still i'm wondering why this is.
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[finger]

Long time lurker - first time poster. I have just recently stepped into the world of color, trying to grasp the subtleties of value/hue/saturation. This is a great thread, and some of the simple definitions here have helped me already.

I just thought this was worth sharing. Playing around in photoshop, I was measuring the value of my colors by switching to greyscale. This quickly showed me that, sometimes, the colors hue would trick me into misjudging the value. I think I increased my accuracy with the values, after just a little while of playing like this. Anyway - I started using an adjustment layer, set to Hue/saturation; (saturation cranked down all the way down). I put this on the top of my stack, and could easily toggle between greyscale/color by turning the layer on and off. I think I'm going to start using this adjustment layer with all my future painting, to check the values.
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-Finger-

[Mari]

Hey!
I read this thread and I have to admit I've been having the same question for a while... Hee ^_^;;
Since I might try to go and paint realistic some day (oh god the horror... I don't have the patience for that!!! But heck. I don't have the skill either) I went to several sites for tutorials and stuff, and I registered on here.

Now I found this site (http://www.metalandmagic.com/) and if you click tutorials you can find 2 tutorials on Realism... Both are very good even though the Digital painting one is not finished yet - which I why I didn't finish my attempt at realism yet either. She hasn't explained how to paint people yet ^_^;;

Anyway, I hope this helps! It helped me on deciding about the colours - there's a bit about that in there too. Especially that FARP article has a great deal to say about colour.

Good luck, I'd like to see how good you are

[AndyT]

Cool. I've been looking for the exercise and images that spooge posted ...
couldn't find it though.

Two threads that kinda fit I think:
http://forums.sijun.com/viewtopic.php?t=31438
About values and colors ... I think this image might be interesting for those who haven't seen it yet:
http://lemenaide.150m.com/pt2.jpg

http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=3148
About some of the things spooge mentioned that have to do with color choice ... like speculars.
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[jHof]

To go along with AndyT's Panting Tutorial 1 image, here is the orginal post of Fred's tutorial. Very good info.

http://forums.sijun.com/viewtopic.php?t=31438&highlight=

[AndyT]

I posted both the thread and the image.

... might as well add the links to all of them:
http://forums.sijun.com/viewtopic.php?t=31438
http://forums.sijun.com/viewtopic.php?t=31503
http://forums.sijun.com/viewtopic.php?p=304170
http://forums.sijun.com/viewtopic.php?p=304171
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[jHof]

Whoop, my bad. Fingers to fast for muh brain.

[ceenda]

Wow, thanks for the heads-up guys. I would've replied earlier but I've just moved home and we're waiting for the DSL to be connected again.

I think I'll practice some of this for the next few speedpaintings. Try to think less about linear colour schemes and try varying hues a bit.

[Mari]

Speed... paintings... I'd screw up with those lol!
I can't even do realistic stuff.

But you're welcome, in case my link helped any.

I also learned that shading has to do with the colour of light that's on your object.

But it all says so in those tutorials.

[-tai-]

I've had that concept on the tip of my tounge for a while, and that nailed the head right in! Thank you thank you thank you spooge!

[Duracel]

I have to ad an example next to the grass-problem.

Most people have the problem of skintones. Last time i realize more and more, skintone is not the problem at all, but its the part you are able to see wrong lighting first(because you see how it is right every day dozen times). Everytime i have the problem with skintones i think about the lightingsituation and most time it helps alot.
Or especially if i watch movies i take a closer look at this point - it helps.


Than i have to say, color is relativ! So i.e. if you have a red coat, grey parts would seem to be greenish.
In the example of spooge, ceenda posted, you might think of purple on the shirt next to his hand, but its only low saturated red which seems to be purple, because of the yellowish lit areas.
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www.duracel.de Gallery

Detailling a speedpainting is nothing but speedpainting in detail.

[jfrancis]

Similar to the architectural painting example someone posted above, but with a simple shape.

http://www.digitalartform.com