It's been over a decade, but I decided to jump right into painting again. I'm running into the same problem I did back then.
The problem I have run into is mixing and matching colors. I'm working on images of the oregon coast and seascapes. It's not tropical, the water is rarely blue. There's a lot of green, gray, and odd blues in the water.
I'm not sure how to go about mixing to get the right shades. Here's some reference photos, tell me what you would mix to get to the right shades.
You can see how varied the water pallet can get.
I've been mixing the following for different results:
- Titanium White
- Pthalo Blue
- Bright Blue
- Aqua
- Leaf Green
- Pewter Gray
- Pale Blue
Every other painting of oceanscapes and waves I've done were tropical, which was easy to mix right out of the bottles. Oregon water colors are evading me. There seems to be a gray green with blue tones that I can't lock down.
What are your thoughts? Mixing tips? Obvious bottled colors I missed? I could really use the help.
>>2532541
Rather than using pre-made blues, greens, and greys, have you tried mixing them yourself? Try using some yellows and blues to make greens. You can also use a tiny bit of red or something else to knock down the chroma.
I would avoid truing to find a colour that already matches things and instead learn to mix colours from scratch. Most palettes use a warm and cool of each primary plus a white and a black. With that you could mix just about any ordinary colour (no magenta or neon colours, but otherwise just about anything).
>>2532597
Yes. I've tried mixing using bases listed on >>2532541. It's a matter of getting that green/blue/gray that is stumping me. Oregon blue is not very tropical. There's almost a red or lavender affect to it that I can't match.
I'm fairly stumped at this point.
Is anyone seeing different colors than I am?
Do you mind posting what your painting looks like?
Vaguely speaking if your colour is coming out too bright and blue instead of grey just keep "breaking" the colour by mixing in complementary colours.
It also seems like your palette is mainly cool (?) blues and greens. Unless you're working on a limited palette I'll recommend you add in some warm colours. I'm guessing you chose those colours for a reason though so I'll leave it up to you.
Best of luck.
>>2532506
I'm willing to bet you're not desaturating your colours enough. In this picture, the main portion of the water isn't blue or green but a very slightly tinted grey. Even the strongest green in the waves is really desaturated.
I suggest you try to isolate the different areas of colour to be able to better judge them, it's hard as fuck at first but you'll be surprised how fast your judgement will improve with practice.
As for the actual mixing, I'd start by mixing the fully saturated colour, in this case the light green, with perhaps say, pthalo blue and yellow. Then knock it way back with the opposite colour on a colour wheel, some sort of reddish purple, and finally lighten it up with some white.
Or just start with a neutral grey and add a bit of green to it, I dunno. There's no one true way to mix paint, especially dull shades like these. You're bound to end up with them eventually.
>>2533315
You're probably right. I'm working too much with Pthalo Blue or Bright Blue, which ends up saturated no matter how much white or gray I add. Working with tinted grays may be the way to go and I hadn't thought about it.
Thanks
>>2533215
The current painting is extremely work in progress. It took me 3 days just to get the sky and clouds just the way I needed to see them (which isn't perfect). I'm in the planning stage for the water and waves. There's also a headland involved.
I'm working with stuff from my pictures and this page for guidance:
http://www.artinstructionblog.com/oil-painting-wave-techniques-tutorial-by-byron-pickering
This was my first painting in over 10 years. I followed a video on youtube just to see if I could paint anymore (watched lots of Bob Ross and anything that made sense (not ANY twitch streamers)).
Clouds, surf, water color, and other things. I've followed what I can. Matched it with a digital pad before I decided to use real medium and skill.
