Observational Color:

Introduction

O VERV IE W
One of the greatest gifts of sight is our ability to distinguish colors. The human eye can distinguish
around 10,000,000 colors. This may be why the Impressionist movement had and continues to
have a large following. The transition from black and white training can feel daunting. There are so
many choices, so many variations of paint colors and formulas. Do we use viridian green or pthalo
green? Opaque or transparent? What about limited or extensive palettes? How do we learn to
observe color?
With a plethora of combinations, it is wise to break our studies into small manageable portions.
We will first learn some of the terminology of the color language, followed by simple color exer-
cises, and graduating to more complex observations.

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 Observational Color:
Introduction

MATERIALS
We will be using a warm and cool primary palette for
• Standard painting materials as this series. You will need titanium white, cadmium
discussed in other painting lessons lemon, cadmium yellow medium, cadmium red light,
• Recommended palette permanent rose or alizarin crimson, cerulean or manga-
titanium white nese blue, cobalt or ultramarine blue. As there are no
cadmium lemon pure pigments for our mixing purposes, the warm and
cad yellow medium
cool primary palette offers the greatest range or clean
cad red light
permanent rose
color mixing possibilities. Our pigments tend to have a
cobalt blue color bias. Cerulean blue has a slight yellow leaning
manganese blue while ultramarine has a slight violet leaning. For
instance, if one wishes to mix a vivid purple, they would
use the cooler red from this palette (alizarin or perma-
- TIP - nent rose) with either cobalt blue or ultramarine. These
colors are closer to a purple to begin with and contain
Set up your palette like the less of the complementary colors which would dull the
color wheel laid out straight. purple. If one used the cadmium red light, which leans
Start with white then move more towards the yellow family, it would create a duller
from warm to cool. purple mixture.

Suggested Reading:
*"Blue and yellow don't make green"
by Michael Wilcox
*"Color and Light: a guide for the realist painter"
by James Gurney
*"Designer's Guide to Color Combinations"
by Leslie Cabarga
*"The Designer's Guide to Global Color Combinations"
by Leslie Cabarga

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 Observational Color:
Introduction

TERMS

Value: The lightness or darkness of a color,

for example, lemon yellow or titanium
white are a 9 or W on the value scale.

Chroma: The intensity or strength of color, or

its purity of color, i.e. freedom from
white or gray. For example, pure
cadmium red light has a very intense
chroma right out of the tube.

Hue: The property of light by which the

color of an object is classified as red,
blue, green, or yellow in reference to
the spectrum. For example, describ-
ing a tomato as red.

Tint: In color theory, a tint is a color with

white added to lighten it. A tint can
also mean a very pale color, such as "
lightly tinted with blush pink." It can
also mean the shade of a color. For
example, "her cheeks took on a rosy
tint from exercise."

Tone: A color mixed with gray.

Shade: The reverse of a tint, it is a color

mixed with black to darken it.

Saturation: Is comparison of chroma with a pre-

determined chroma or standard
chroma. For example, I may check if
the student grade cadmium red I just
purchased is as saturated as the
higher end brand.

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 Observational Color:
Introduction

TERMS (cont.)

Primary Colors: These are the three building blocks of

the color wheel, which can not be
mixed. They are red, blue, yellow. In
theory, all other colors are mixed
from these three colors. If I run out of
red pigment, I can't mix anything to
create it, as it is a primary color. If all
three primaries are mixed, they create
black, and are called subtractive
color. However, in nature, with light,
if the three primaries are mixed, they
create white light, and are call addi-
tive color. For this reason, our pig-
ments can not perfectly simulate
nature's colors.

Secondary These fall between each adjacent

Colors: primary color and are achieved
through mixing two primaries
together. They are green, orange, and
purple. Primaries red+yellow=
orange, primaries yellow+blue=
green, and primaries
red+blue=purple.

Tertiary Colors: These are mixtures of a primary and

secondary color adjacent on the color
wheel. For example, blue and green
make aqua, or blue-green.

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 Observational Color:
Introduction

TERMS (cont.)

Complimentary These are colors which are on oppo-

Colors: site sides of the color wheel. They tend
to vibrate off of, or compliment one
another, as they don’t share any char-
acteristics of hue with each other. It is
most important to memorize the pri-
mary and secondary color positions,
so you can quickly think of color com-
pliments. For red, it is green, for
yellow, it is purple, and for blue it is
orange.

Analogous Any three colors side by side on a 12

Color: part color wheel (primary, secondary,
and tertiary colors)

Split- A variation of compliment scheme. In

Complimentary: addition to the base color, it uses the
two analogous colors adjacent to its
compliment. For example, it would be
blue, with red-orange, and yellow-
orange.

Triadic Any three colors equally spaced on the

color scheme: color wheel-for example, orange,
green, and purple.

Tetradic A double compliment scheme, such as

color scheme: red and green with blue and orange.

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