Sharpen Your Color Sense

Perspectives from The Artist's Road

Morning Light - Color Samples 1 -6 as sampled from photograph

Because the eye and the brain are constantly adjusting to the changing hues and values of sunlight and shadows when painting outdoors, it can be difficult to see those changes as they happen to our subject. If one is unaware that the original light has changed, the attempt to make adjustments can result in the lack of a definite color key and muddy paint colors. Monet famously changed canvases hourly as his highly trained eye detected that the light had changed upon his subject.