As a member of the Huntsville Art Crowd we are fortunate to have fellow members share their expertise with weekly workshops for the super fantastic price of only $4.This week Carole Rudderham discussed colour. You can view Carol's site here: http://www.yourbestimages.com/Carole_s_Page.html

Colour is something that I handle fairly well naturally -- equally naturally I tend towards laziness about the subject. You won't see me making colour charts, or colour wheels, or value charts. (Seriously, I still don't get why I would need to do that more than once. . . unless I am trying to re-invent the Quiller Wheel) And, as it occasionally happens, I paid attention in school in regards to primaries, secondaries, tertiaries, & their compliments. I also remember 4 of the 5 colour schemes: Monochromatic, Complimentary, Analogous, and Triad. (I did forget about split complimentary). But beyond that I simply try to mimic what I see, if I feel like I need to. And if it gets muddy...I scrap or paint over. The limits of my control and consideration. Which makes me a poor watercolour painter.

Well! imagine my delight when presented with the following nifty piece of information! A MUST HAVE knowledge for avoiding muddy colours!

Each of the hues below have a tint. We all know this. Yellow green/blue-green, yellow orange/red orange. To mix brillant colours you want to keep in the same tint zone. Mix your red tints with your red tints, your yellow tints with yellow tints, and blue tints with blue tints. So, you can mix a red colour with a blue tint & a blue colour with a red tint together. Just avoid mixing a red colour with a blue tint together with a blue colour with a yellow tint. Or a yellow colour with a red tint and a red colour with a blue tint. So what you don't want is 3 tints competeing. Then you have mud.

Notice you can mix cobalt blue with anything.

Other interesting tidbits:

Paintings should be mostly warm, or mostly cool.

Light colours surrounded by dark colours become bigger and brighter (visually). The opposite is also true.

Focal points should have your brightest colours, whitest whites, and darkest blacks.

Connect your darks and lights

90-95% of your painting should be semi neutral or neutral. 5% is your bright/brilliant colours.

Links

http://www.colormatters.com/colortheory.html Color Professor J.L. Morton welcomes you to the world of color.

Before the arrival of the World Wide Web, I served as faculty at the University of Hawaii School of Architecture, Chaminade University and Matsuda Technology Center. Today, I present seminars about color and marketing, color theory and everything that color impacts.

The primary focus of my work since 1988 is color psychology. As a branding expert, I've provided color consultation for a vast array of projects - for clients such as Tylenol, Nokia Mobile Phones, Eastman Kodak and Dow Chemical. Please visit my business web site, Colorcom, for more information.


Most recently, I've written and published a series of eBooks about color entitled Color Voodoo. They're the sum total of every color course I've ever taught and all the research I've conducted.
The Color Matters web site is a continuation of my teaching and my passion for color.

http://www.reuels.com/reuels/Quiller_Palette.html Arranged for ease of accurate mixing of primary, secondary and intermediate colors. Indicator guides on the palette aid in locating anologous, complementary and triadic color relationships to ensure fresh, beautiful, harmonious color mixes. Includes 12 extra pans around the wheel for other favorite colors, 8 outside corner basins to place earth colors or opaque water media and a very large inner-wheel mixing area. Also includes an instruction guide on how to arrange your palette. 14" x 14".

http://www.quillergallery.com/art_supplies/sq_wheel.htm One of the most important advantages is that this color wheel lists only colors that are rated lightfast by the American Standard Trade Materials Association. More than 70 artist tube colors are located on the wheel for the most accurate analogous, complementary and triad mixes.