Wednesday, January 23, 2008

Valuing Your Values

Yesterday I mentioned that the values in your painting are important. Here's an example of mine that shows you just that.

The drawing with little value variation:
The drawing with values heightened:


The first one is very accurate, the second is accurate and has panache. That's the difference that values can make. All that changed was that I darkened certain areas in the second one.

Purcell offers a few ideas to help you see values more:
  • when looking at a possible subject, don't describe the objects, describe the values (e.g. I like those dark vertical shapes against that light patch.)
  • go through a stack of photos, paint the darkest shapes, add some water and paint the midtone shapes, then move on to the next photo - the idea being to train yourself to see the value shapes first

3 comments:

Jo Castillo said...

This is a great example. The darks really pull the drawing together.

Making A Mark said...

I like his exercises - a neat idea.

Robyn Sinclair said...

Beautiful drawing, Rose. There is nothing more satisfying, I believe, than working up the values in graphite - maybe charcoal, but I'm so messy with that.