The Lightness or Darkness of a Surface Is the Lement of Art Called

Value

Now that we've established line, shape, and spatial relationships, we tin can turn our attention to surface qualities and their importance in works of art. Value (or tone), color and texture are the elements used to exercise this.

Value is the relative lightness or darkness of a shape in relation to another. The value scale, bounded on one end past pure white and on the other by black, and in betwixt a series of progressively darker shades of grey, gives an artist the tools to make these transformations. The value scale below shows the standard variations in tones. Values near the lighter end of the spectrum are termed high-keyed, those on the darker cease are low-keyed.

Value Scale, 11 July 2012, Creator: Oliver Harrison, CC Past

In two dimensions, the utilise of value gives a shape the illusion of mass and lends an entire composition a sense of lite and shadow. The two examples below show the effect value has on changing a shape to a form.

2D Form, eleven July 2012, Creator: Oliver Harrison, CC BY

3D Form, 11 July 2012, Creator: Oliver Harrison, CC Past

This same technique brings to life what begins as a unproblematic line drawing of a swain'due south head in Michelangelo's Head of a Youth and a Correct Paw from 1508. Shading is created with line (refer to our give-and-take of line earlier in this module) or tones created with a pencil. Artists vary the tones by the corporeality of resistance they apply between the pencil and the paper they're drawing on. A drawing pencil's leads vary in hardness, each ane giving a different tone than another. Washes of ink or colour create values determined past the amount of water the medium is dissolved into.

The employ of high contrast, placing lighter areas of value against much darker ones, creates a dramatic effect, while low contrast gives more subtle results. These differences in issue are evident in 'Guiditta and Oloferne' past the Italian painter Caravaggio, and Robert Adams' photograph Untitled, Denver from 1970-74. Caravaggio uses a loftier contrast palette to an already dramatic scene to increment the visual tension for the viewer, while Adams deliberately makes use of low dissimilarity to underscore the drabness of the landscape surrounding the figure on the cycle.

Caravaggio, Guiditta Decapitates Oloferne, 1598, oil on canvas. National Gallery of Italian Art, Rome. This work is in the public domain

Color

Colour is the almost complex artistic element because of the combinations and variations inherent in its apply.  Humans respond to color combinations differently, and artists study and use color in part to give desired direction to their work.

Color is cardinal to many forms of art. Its relevance, use and function in a given piece of work depend on the medium of that work. While some concepts dealing with color are broadly applicable beyond media, others are not.

The total spectrum of colors is contained in white light. Humans perceive colors from the light reflected off objects. A red object, for case, looks red considering it reflects the red role of the spectrum. It would exist a different color under a different light. Colour theory starting time appeared in the 17^th century when English mathematician and scientist Sir Isaac Newton discovered that white lite could be divided into a spectrum by passing information technology through a prism.

The study of color in fine art and design oftentimes starts with color theory. Color theory splits upwardly colors into iii categories: primary, secondary, and tertiary.

The basic tool used is a colour wheel, developed past Isaac Newton in 1666. A more complex model known as the color tree, created by Albert Munsell, shows the spectrum fabricated up of sets of tints and shades on continued planes.

There are a number of approaches to organizing colors into meaningful relationships. Most systems differ in construction only.

Traditional Model

Traditional color theory is a qualitative endeavor to organize colors and their relationships. It is based on Newton'due south colour wheel, and continues to be the well-nigh common system used past artists.

Blue Yellow Ruby Color Bike. Released nether the GNU Free Documentation License

Traditional color theory uses the aforementioned principles as subtractive color mixing (see beneath) but prefers dissimilar primary colors.

• The main colors are blood-red, blueish, and yellow. You find them equidistant from each other on the color wheel. These are the "elemental" colors; not produced by mixing any other colors, and all other colors are derived from some combination of these three.
• The secondary colors are orange (mix of carmine and xanthous), green (mix of blue and yellowish), and violet (mix of blue and red).
• The tertiary colors are obtained by mixing i chief color and 1 secondary colour. Depending on amount of colour used, unlike hues can exist obtained such as cherry-orange or yellow-dark-green. Neutral colors (browns and grays) can be mixed using the three primary colors together.
• White and blackness lie exterior of these categories. They are used to lighten or darken a color. A lighter color (made past adding white to it) is called a tint , while a darker color (made by adding blackness) is chosen a shade .

Color Mixing

A more quantifiable approach to colour theory is to think nearly colour as the consequence of light reflecting off a surface. Understood in this way, colour can be represented as a ratio of amounts of main color mixed together.

Additive color theory is used when different colored lights are beingness projected on tiptop of each other. Projected media produce color by projecting lite onto a reflective surface. Where subtractive mixing creates the impression of color by selectively arresting part of the spectrum, additive mixing produces color by selective project of part of the spectrum. Common applications of additive color theory are theater lighting and television screens. RGB color is based on condiment color theory.

• The primary colors are red, blue, and light-green.
• The secondary colors are yellowish (mix of red and light-green), cyan (mix of blue and dark-green), and magenta (mix of bluish and red).
• The tertiary colors are obtained by mixing the to a higher place colors at dissimilar intensities.

White is created past the confluence of the three main colors, while black represents the absenteeism of all color. The lightness or darkness of a color is determined by the intensity/density of its various parts. For instance: a middle-toned gray could be produced by projecting a cherry, a blue and a dark-green light at the same point with 50% intensity.

Additive Color Representation. This image is in the public domain.

The primaries are red, green and blue. White is the confluence of all the primary colors; black is the absence of colour.

Subtractive colour theory ("procedure color") is used when a single light source is being reflected by dissimilar colors laid one on tiptop of the other. Color is produced when parts of the external low-cal source's spectrum are absorbed by the material and not reflected dorsum to the viewer's eye. For example, a painter brushes blue paint onto a canvas. The chemic composition of the paint allows all of the colors in the spectrum to be absorbed except blue, which is reflected from the pigment's surface.  Subtractive color works equally the reverse of additive colour theory. Common applications of subtractive color theory are used in the visual arts, color press and processing photographic positives and negatives. The chief colors are red, yellow, and bluish.

• The secondary colors are orange, green and violet.
• The tertiary colors are created by mixing a primary with a secondary color.
• Black is mixed using the iii primary colors, while white represents the absence of all colors. Note: considering of impurities in subtractive color, a true black is incommunicable to create through the mixture of primaries. Because of this the effect is closer to brown. Like to condiment color theory, lightness and darkness of a color is determined past its intensity and density.

Subtractive Color Mixing. Released under the GNU Gratuitous Documentation License

The primaries are blue, yellow and red.

Color Attributes

There are many attributes to color. Each one has an effect on how we perceive information technology.

• Hue refers to color itself, merely besides to the variations of a color.
• Value (as discussed previously) refers to the relative lightness or darkness of one colour adjacent to another. The value of a color can brand a difference in how it is perceived. A color on a dark groundwork will appear lighter, while that same color on a calorie-free background will appear darker.
• Tone refers to the gradation or subtle changes made to a colour when it'southward mixed with a greyness created by calculation 2 complements (run into Complementary Colour below). You lot can see diverse color tones by looking at the color tree mentioned in the paragraph to a higher place.
• Saturation refers to the purity and intensity of a color. The primaries are the most intense and pure, but diminish as they are mixed to form other colors. The cosmos of tints and shades also diminish a color's saturation. 2 colors work strongest together when they share the aforementioned intensity. This is called equiluminance.

Color Interactions

Beyond creating a mixing hierarchy, color theory as well provides tools for understanding how colors work together.

Monochrome

The simplest color interaction is monochrome. This is the use of variations of a single hue. The advantage of using a monochromatic color scheme is that y'all become a high level of unity throughout the artwork because all the tones relate to one another. Run across this in Mark Tansey's Derrida Queries de Human from 1990.

Coordinating Colour

Analogous colors are like to one some other. As their proper noun implies, analogous colors can be found next to one another on any 12-part color wheel:

Analogous Color, 11 July 2012, Creator: Oliver Harrison. CC BY

You can run into the outcome of analogous colors in Paul Cezanne's oil painting Auvers Panoromic View

Color Temperature

Colors are perceived to have temperatures associated with them. The color wheel is divided into warm and cool colors. Warm colors range from yellow to red, while cool colors range from yellow-green to violet.  Y'all can accomplish complex results using but a few colors when you pair them in warm and absurd sets.

Warm absurd color, eleven July 2012, Creator: Oliver Harrison. CC By

Complementary Colors

Complementary colors are plant directly opposite one another on a color bike. Hither are some examples:

• purple and yellow
• dark-green and red
• orange and blue

Complementary Color, xi July 2012, Creator: Oliver Harrison. CC BY

Blue and orangish are complements. When placed near each other, complements create a visual tension. This colour scheme is desirable when a dramatic event is needed using merely 2 colors. The painting Untitled past Keith Haring is an case. Yous can click the painting to create a larger image.

A split complementary color scheme uses one color plus the ii colors on each side of the first color'due south complement on the color wheel.  Like the utilise of complements, a split complement creates visual tension simply includes the variety of a third color.

Split Complementary Color, 11 July 2012, Creator: Oliver Harrison. CC BY

Color Subtraction refers to a visual phenomenon where the advent of one colour will lessen its presence in a nearby color. For instance, orange (red + yellow) on a blood-red background volition announced more like yellow. Don't misfile color subtraction with the subtractive color system mentioned earlier in this module. Color subtraction uses specific hues inside a color scheme for a certain visual effect.

Simultaneous Contrast

Neutrals on a colored groundwork will appear tinted toward that colour'south complement, considering the heart attempts to create a residual. (Grey on a red background will appear more light-green, for example.) In other words, the color volition shift away from the surrounding color. As well, not-dominant colors will appear tinted towards the complement of the dominant colour.

Color interaction affect values, equally well. Colors appear darker on or well-nigh lighter colors, and lighter on or nigh darker colors. Complementary colors volition wait more intense on or near each other than they volition on or near grays (refer dorsum to the Keith Haring example higher up to see this outcome).

Simultaneous Dissimilarity, 11 July 2012, Creator: Oliver Harrison. CC By

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Source: https://courses.lumenlearning.com/sanjac-masteryart1/chapter/reading-artistic-elements-part-1-2/

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