I have oft said over the past 13 years or so around here, that ninety percent of the time something is not quite right with a painting it will likely come down to an issue with values....and so convinced, I actually started a book on that notion, somewhat cliche...dealing with our coming into a midvalues crisis time of our life!
Critiquing many works over the years, especially in the Structured Critique forum which was one of my forums to moderate since its origins...I would take someone's painting submitted and more often than not convert it to gray scale just to show what I sense straight off...that the work suffered in lacking variation, lacking atmospheric depth perception and illusion (came off sadly flat)...and what a simple adjustment to values would do.
I've quoted John F. Carlson near ad nauseum as those who know me would attest on how darks lighten going back into space, how all colors cool and for the most part desaturate. Quote Emile Gruppe in reference to his color palette strategies and how he would say near ANY color scheme would work so long as values are spot on...
So...in my absence of much of the past 5-6 months I've been doing Go To Meetings for F&W...and working on some coursework for Artist Network University...and in fact, one is coming up September 11th I hope some will check out. Called, "Plein Air Essentials- Take Control With A Values Driven Palette"
http://www.artistsnetworkuniversity....driven-palette
To prepare for the final week's session, was out this past week...knew I had about two hours before a major thunderstorm was to come thru. This piece above is not quite finished...14"x 18" ...need to finish power lines and obsess with edges...but, the last half hour was with threatening dark clouds overhead, thunder...and just as I thru the last bit of stuff in the back of my truck it came down.
The palette I intended for this was to expand beyond just the main value groups of each color (Dark, Mid, Light) to include half-tones...but, what was of interest to me is...the expanded values are not necessary as transitions to make this work any more than it does already. As said, a few things to finish...but it works. This then, by admission...demonstrated to me too how little is necessary for painterly suggestiveness to pull off.
So...with just the main values...shown on this palette here...of a dark, mid, light plus white came the results you see above. Now...had I found it good and proper, adding the halftones would have added two variations to each main value group of each color...
So frankly...that would have been 39 total premixed piles of pigments. Really as a limited palette...the employed strategy would have provided more than enough color/value to choose from, demonstrating also the "limited" palette was not so limiting. But...instead, only these main values/colors proved necessary...
Here is a .gif animation...of a gouache I did of a local area, just in grayscale...and again, surprises me just how little information is necessary to create a painterly suggestive realism...
Again...only four main values.
Linear Mode
