I cannot stress the importance of mastering values enough. Ninety percent of the realism in your painting is created by achieving accurate values. Value is much more important than color (or more strictly, "hue") in this respect.

In addition, if you do not master values completely, you will never be able to master color in your paintings, since no matter how accurate you match the hue, if the value is not correct you will not get a good color harmony. This is because there is a strict relationship between the colors on the light and shadow sides of objects. If you get this relationship correct, the object looks real. Get it wrong and the person looking at your painting will know that something does not look right. (For more detailed information on getting this relationship correct, see Form Unit 3). This unit is all about how to observe values, and will give you all the tips and techniques I have picked up over the years.

To help you master this process, before going to full color, you can also go to the intermediate stage of painting a limited value study. This has some real advantages, not just as a learning tool, but also as a means for further exploring and refining your notan composition (I often do this stage when planning a large studio painting). With this study you can explore: light/dark patterns, edges of form and cast shadows, and much more advanced things such as lost and found edges. It is much quicker and easier to explore these aspects of your composition in black and white, rather than going to full color right away.

In this course unit

In this unit you will learn how to simplify the process of seeing color by breaking it down into three simpler choices of value, saturation, and temperature. You will learn:

• how to simplify the process of seeing color by breaking it down into three simpler choices of value, saturation, and temperature
• how to see values accurately
• how to create powerful limited value studies — an important prerequisite for achieving realism in your work, developing powerful compositions, and ultimately having great color

Total number of assignments: 8

Total number of pages: 24