Painting in oil or acrylic: A direct approach. by Philippe Gandiol

Transcription

1 Painting in oil or acrylic: A direct approach by Philippe Gandiol

2 Composition Specific arrangement of components or shapes in the picture. It should be in tune with our feelings and emotions and add beauty to the picture. A well-balanced composition and the understanding of basic rules is a key to successful painting. The basic rules of composition are : Division of space - Golden section: divide the height and width of your canvas by The intersection of these 2 lines is the location of your center of interest - Rule of thirds: divide the surface in thirds. Each intersection is a sweet spot Primary division, secondary division 1/3 (quiet, peaceful) 1/5 (drama, active) Never cut anything exactly in half horizontally, vertically or diagonally Focal point / center of interest - What s the intent: land, water, sky? Object or emptiness/space - Focus: Just like we do when we look at things: focus on one the rest being out of focus. Sometimes it is different from its surroundings; sometimes it is the culmination of the other elements in the painting. All other parts are subordinated to the focus of the painting (under paint them, leave them in shadow, keep the edges loose) - Avoid clutter, which weakens the composition and the focus. Less is more. - Does the painting read? Is there a path the viewer can follow to the center of interest? Movement and rhythm Understand how to use the lines: Horizontal: restful, calm Vertical: rigid Zig zag, diagonal: active motion, dramatic action Crisscrossed: conflicted Curved, wavy: meandering, wandering, and flowing Shapes and groupings: - A big simple shape carries best of all. Variety in shapes. Shapes of the same size rob a picture of scale and are monotonous - Stop the eye to keep it in the painting - Overlap to create depth. - Group large numbers of anything: objects, shapes, people. Balance - Visual weight, energy, tension of the masses and lines are determined by the size, the placement, the edges, the shapes and color. - Static versus dynamic balance: Symmetrical arrangement, or shapes with identical weight and energy create a static balance. Asymmetrical arrangement of shapes with various weight, energy, tension create a dynamic balance. Avoid - Exit at corner or center, end at edge of canvas, lean out, draw attention to corner, suggest point of interest outside the canvas - Repeat similar shapes - Closing (gates, large object in foreground barring the entrance to the painting) - Strong horizontals on vertical canvas or strong verticals on horizontal canvas - Twin attract too much attention, three is much more dynamic. Use variety in repetition.

3 Brushwork Uses of Strokes Form: To describe the form of an object Texture: hard, angular, feathery, dots Contrast: one kind of stroke against another. Thickness: thicker impasto for close objects, focal point, strong movement (waves crashing). Thinner strokes for distance, soft, atmospheric. Width: size of the stroke larger when the object is closer and smaller as it recedes. Value: light and dark strokes Direction: point you around the picture. Describe the lay of the land. Density: need breathing space. Alternate between dense thick and sparse thin. Types of brushes: - Bristle brushes have springy, show texture - Synthetic/sable/mongoose brushes are much softer. Great for fabric, portraits, soft edge work. - Bright: Square ends with short hair. firm edge to depict crisp forms like architecture. Short, controlled strokes with thicker paint. They tend to make square brushstrokes. - Flat: Square ends and longer hair than brights. Hold paint well. Good for longer strokes or finer lines when used on the edge. Good for covering large areas with thicker paint. - Filbert: like a flat with an oval shape tip. Creates a more rounded stroke. They can make either thick or thin stroke. Better at blending than flats. - Round: Rounded pointed tip. Good for thinner lines and long strokes with thinner paint. Good for finer details. - Liner: Long soft hair. Use to lay thin lines of paint. Good for signing your name. - Palette and painting knives: Mixing and scraping paint. They are very useful at keeping your brushes cleaner. When applying paint with them, they make hard marks and thin lines. Care: Good brushes are critical for good painting. Keep them in canisters or jars, handles down and hair up. After a painting session, wipe excess paint with paper towels. Rinse them in odorless mineral spirit to remove as much paint as possible. Finally, wash them with mild soap and lukewarm water (not hot!). Squeeze out the excess water, reshape the tips and lay them down flat to dry so water won t run into the ferrule. Holding your brush: Like a stick not like a pencil as it would make the painting too tight. Away from the ferrule for looser strokes and closer to the ferrule for details. Brushwork - Active and rapid - Slower and more deliberate - One stroke, one statement. - Brush confidence: Look at John Singer Sargent paintings. Sensuous strokes conveying authority, conviction, and utmost confidence. Only achieved through constant practice and repetition. - Great brushwork is made of many factors: Painting surface - smooth, rough Consistency of the paint If the stroke is applied to a wet or dry area Amount of paint on the brush How pressure is applied during the stroke.

4 Values Definition Value means darkness or lightness, white being the lowest value and black the highest. Most painters refer to a grouping of 9 values: four in the light with white being the lightest, 4 in the dark with black being the darkest and 1 in the middle. It is the value scale. Contrast With so few values to work with, we need to use contrast to allow us to discriminate one thing from another. The degree of contrast will determine how bright or how faint the light will be in a picture. Increasing the contrast between two values will intensifies the smaller of the two: a white flower against a large dark background will look even whiter. Contrast creates clarity. No contrast creates confusion. Value key - A picture containing white plus its close three or four values is considered a high-key painting. A bright sunny day is usually high key - A picture using the darker end of the scale is considered a low-key painting. It is generally dramatic, atmospheric, mysterious - The middle key is the most frequently used range as it adapts well to the regular daylight scene or setting. The danger with that it can be quite ordinary unless it is handled with great sensitivity. Squinting - Squinting allows you to identify values by simplifying what you see. Rely on what you see when you squint down. Do not squint for colors. Never squint at your canvas. Do not forget to keep squinting as our natural tendency is to forget to squint to see a vague area more clearly. Do not stare, as more values than we need will appear. Do not paint the actual shades you see when squinting. Squinting only helps you to see the relationships between the different values - Use comparison to get the right value: is this shape lighter or darker than this other one? Comparison is most effective when you step back (about 8 feet) Economy Better to use fewer values: the great masters who maintained simple value patterns in their painting seldom used more than five values: it will yield a more powerful visual effect and it is unnecessary to use all values in a subject. Use colors instead and save a value. Patterns Simple patterns of three values are very effective: dark, middle and light. The smallest value area become the point of interest. Tips - watch out for highlights as they are not as bright as you think. Make them a color not white. Just a few are enough - Dark accents are always more effective than highlights. Look for them. They will be very warm in temperature. - Practice squinting until it becomes second nature. Go by what you see when you squint.

5 Edges Definition Edges are borderlines between shapes of color where they fit together. They are described as hard very abrupt - or soft very gradual. When a shape or color blends into another so gradually that it is impossible to tell when one finished and the other starts it is called a lost edge. Edges describe matter: hard substances like rocks, metal have sharp edges while softer substances like wood, cloth, etc., have soft edges Causes of edges - The shape of things will cause an edge: square objects like a box, a building will cause hard edges. Rounded object like a ball, a fold in fabric, a figure will cause soft edges. - Elements or shapes similar in value or color will appear to have softer transition between them than elements which contrast (in value or color) even thought the real edge is the same. - Atmosphere: how clear or murky it is will produce different edges. Fog for example will produce very soft edges. - Light: how strong or weak will produce hard or soft edges. - Movement (birds, clouds) produces softer edges. - Hard edges increase focus and come forward. Soft edges decrease focus and go back. Seeing edges: squinting and comparison First be aware of them: pick out individual things and ask yourself a few questions: - Are colors or values the same in the adjacent shape? Are you looking at something complex or unclear or something geometric with sharp angles? Are shapes in bright light or dim shadows? - Learn to squint and compare, just like with values. Concentrate. Notice carefully what changes and merge into larger shapes and what does NOT change this is a strong element - Some edges will stand out as being very soft or very hard. These are your standards of comparison. You will be able then to determine the relative softness or hardness of the other edges. Painting edges Paint an edge as it appears regardless of anything else you know about it. - Blending: (Sargent, Zorn) it s easy with oil paint. Wet into wet edges can be created with your brush, your finger, a rag If your paint has dried use the dry brush (heavily loaded brush dragged lightly over the already painted area or scrumbling ( lightly loaded brush scrubing the surface ) When the painting has dried, I prefer to repaint the area and proceed with wet into wet edges. Much easier. - With intermediate colors: (the impressionists) the boundaries between shapes of color also has color changes within their edges. Sunsets and sunrise. Figure studies are particularly rich in color changes on edges. - With intermediate colors and blending. Put in the intermediate colors and then blend. (Sorolla) Do not get carried away with blended edges. Indiscriminate blending weakens a work. Conclusion - The vast majority of edges in any subject will fall into the intermediate range between hardness and softness. - Avoid painting thickly as you are manipulating edges. It is much easier to control in moderate layers. - The aim is to generate dominant and subordinate edges which act to reinforce the overall composition and emphasizing the center of interest.

6 Color and light How can we use color to convey a sense of light in what we are painting? How can we use color the convey depth and richness in our paintings? They work hand in hand as one create the other: light creates the colors that surround us and colors create the light in our paintings. Colors perception and properties Color is complex and is subject to 3 influences: - Local colors (pigment or lack of as in water, clouds where it take colors from other sources - Influence of surrounding colors - The ambient light surrounding a subject Color perception is subjective: We are attracted to some colors and not others. Some colors triggers more or less emotional responses. We have pre-conceived ideas of what color something should be: milk is white, tree trunks are brown, mountains are purple etc. Misinformation: -Warm colors advancing and cool colors receding in landscape painting: sometimes colors appear cooler with distance but not always. - Colors going together or colors clashing: personal opinion. - Names given to many colors are worthless: canary yellow, fuchsia, ocean blue, etc. - The notion that you either have a color sense or you don t. Or that it is too complex to master. Color has three main properties: - Hue: the identity of the color itself. Warm and cool colors. - Saturation (chroma or intensity): how pure a hue is. A color is most intense in its purest form (bright). Mixing tends to produce less intense hues (dull). - Value: the relative lightness or darkness of a color compared to a grey scale. Yellow right out of the tube is bright. Blue right out of the tube is dark. Tint refers to a color mixed with white. Shade refers to a color mixed with black. The Color Wheel: It demonstrates color relationships: - Primary colors: blue, red and yellow - Secondary colors: orange, green and purple created by mixing two primaries. Also called complementary as they are directly across from the primaries. - Tertiary colors located between each primary and secondary color: yellow-green, yelloworange, blue-green, etc. - Analogous colors located close together on the color wheel: blue, blue green and green for example. It also illustrates color temperature: - On one side yellows, oranges and reds being warm and on the other greens, blues and purples being cool. It is not an intrinsic property of the pigment. It is how warm and cool a color looks to us compared to its surrounding colors. Green for example may seem cool compare to red but warm compared to blue. - - Temperature is also a quality of light. The color of the daylight changes with the time of day (cooler in the morning and warmer in the evening). Artificial light could warm or cool colors. - The great color law: cool light produces warm shadows and warm light produces cool shadows. Your palette: - Many artists arrange the paints on their palette in the same order as in a spectrum or the color wheel - yellows on one end, reds in the middle, blues and greens at the other end. - I use the spectrum in the center of my palette surrounding by earth tones on each end. - Place the same colors in the same place on your palette so you can get in the habit of finding the color with your brush without having to hunt for it

7 Mixing colors Color Charts: - Valuable for two reasons: You will get to know your paint mixtures and hues and you will have a great reference of color mixtures enabling you to mix your paints quickly and cleanly. - What you will learn besides mixing: - Addition of white changes mixtures beyond lightening them. - Certain extremely dark colors are hard to identify until white is added to them. - Harmony among all colors could increase with the addition of white. - Most colors appear more vivid in the mid-value range. - Many mixtures duplicate each other. - Pigments varies in transparency. - How easy it is to contaminate mixtures unless you keep brushes, knife and palette very clean. - How simple it is to replicate nearly all other colors sold with a modest palette. Color harmony. It s a relationship that unifies colors. Light produces harmony in a subject as it acts as a common denominator to visually unite everything it illuminates. It is not necessarily one that you might enjoy. If any light source on a subject changes significantly the overall harmony changes. It is not what goes with that? but more what color doesn t belong? There is no formulas to create harmony. Study the works of artists who are imaginative and skillful with colors. How does light and atmosphere affect what we see and paint? - Light is warm or cool, intense or diffused. Light may change due to its source (natural or artificial) time of day, season, surrounding reflective surfaces. As light travel through more atmosphere (morning and evening) it has a noticeably different temperature. - The color and value contrast will create the sense of light. Making the contrast greater (warmer and lighter colors in light, cooler and darker colors in shadows) will create a more dramatic result. Be consistent with your treatment of light and shadow. - Reflected lights will appear in shadows and lighten them. Nevertheless these lighter shadows will never be lighter and warmer than the darkest, coolest areas in light. - The moisture and particles in the atmosphere make distant objects look softer, cooler, duller and lighter. It s called atmospheric perspective. Conclusion - Color is one of our most powerful tools. - Colors of things look the way they do because the light on them, the influence of surrounding colors and their pigmentation. We must see the relationship between colors. The question is not what color something is, but rather what color it is compared to all others around it. - A color changes when the light changes or adjacent colors changes. - Limitations of paint prevent us from duplicating the actual brilliance in nature. - Identify the color you are seeing, mix correctly and put it in the right place. - Identify the darkest dark and lightest light. - White is the coolest pigment. Added to any color, it cools it. - Understanding color temperature is key to controlling light. - When painting, try to have the same light on your subject, your palette and your painting. - Warm light produces cool shadows and cool light warm shadows. - Do your charts. - Keep you palette simple, clean and organized. Lay your paint in a logical sequence and at the same place. Don t be stingy with paint. - Color harmony in not simply a pleasing selection of colors. The main source of color harmony is the light on a subject. Most of the time the light on your subject will be weighted toward blue, orange, etc., which means that some other color(s) will be impacted: strong blue light will minimized red and yellow.

8 Recommended instructional books Alla Prima by Richard Schmid The Art Spirit by Robert Henri Color Choices by Stephen Quiller Carlson s guide to Landscape by John Carlson 60 Minutes to Better Painting by Craig Nelson Fill your Oil Paintings with Light and Color by Kevin Macpherson Oil Painting the workshop experience by Ted Goerschner The Simple Secret to better painting by Greg Albert Composition of Outdoor painting by Edgar Payne A Proven Strategy for Creating Great Art by Dan McCaw