Focus the viewer’s attention on one part of your painting composition by making the focal point or focal area more interesting and by directing the viewer’s eye to that point or area. You only need one primary center of interest. For example, when painting marine scenes, if you are interested primarily in the ocean, tone the sky down and simplify it so it doesn’t detract from the ocean. Conversely, if you are primarily interested in the sky, tone down the sea. In this painting composition I use a staccato focal point (a small point or line that the viewer’s eye gravitates towards in the painting) of the two figures.

In this course unit

In many painting compositions you want to focus the viewer’s attention on one part of the painting by making one part of the painting (the focal point or focal area) more interesting and by directing the viewer’s eye to that point or area. In this unit you will learn a range of techniques for doing that in order to give your work more variety and make the painting composition more interesting for the viewer. You will learn:

• the difference between staccato focal points and focal areas
• how to increase the interest of a painting by adding a secondary focal area
• how to use contrast of shape and direction in focal areas
• the role color saturation plays in focal points and focal areas
• how to use the contrast of light and dark to create a focal area
• four tips when using directing lines to enhance your focal areas
• how to use isolation to draw attention to a part of your painting composition
• the role space division plays in creating natural and logical positions for focal points and focal areas
• the principle of one-thirds in positioning focal points
• the use of contrast of temperature for creating focal areas and examples of its use

Total number of assignments: 4

Total number of pages: 19