These are some value studies I demonstrated for a student as a starting point to oil painting. I used a piece of Utrect canvas from a canvas pad 12x9 inches. (Nice stuff.) I taped it to a piece of MDF board (Home Depot) and divided it into quarters. I mixed just four values using Burnt Umber, Ultramarine Blue and T-White. (One of the values was pure white.) The set up has a clear division of light and shadow from a spotlight and having limited ambient light. If you're a beginner, I highly recommend doing a lot of these with simple objects. Avoid shiny objects, glass and flowers. When you look at your subject squint down A LOT while painting. It helps you see the large value shapes simplified. The bottom right quadrant shows how to draw an ellipse by picturing it inside a rectangle. It's not perfect, but close. (I wiped out the rectangle later.) Also pictured, different kind of stroke shapes made with a flat brush. I hope this is helpful to someone out there just starting out. The importance of getting your values right cannot be understated. I have read of art schools that require working in black and white for an entire year before painting with color.
Here is a little 4x6 I painted later just because I thought the set-up was so simple and pretty. It gave me a challenge! I have gotten used to larger sizes. It is for sale at $40.
magnify/purchase SOLD
Simple and pretty, yes.......simple to do, not so much! Another gem Karen!
ReplyDeleteMary, you are so right. I hadn't painted apples for a while, and was surprised that it didn't just paint itself! What was I thinking???!!!
DeleteA very good post. You are dead on about the values having to be right. Love your apple.
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed catching up on your blog. I was reading about your palette colors and saw you took from Kim English. I took anatomy from him for two years at the Art Students League in Denver in the late 80"s. A goup of us used to go plein air painting at weekends. He is great.
Thanks, Julie. What an opportunity you had to study under Kim! I learned so much from him in just a few days. He's really good at individualizing his instruction for what ever level you are at. One of the hallmarks of a great teacher in my opinion.
Deletethanks , this was very interesting !
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