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Understanding Values- Treatise on Values and Evaluating Them

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Winegarfineart wrote
on 20 Nov 2009 1:55 PM

I am a part of a couple of artist groups.  One of these groups consists of very well established artists that discusses different topics.  It is nice to have a group of seasoned individuals to bounce ideas off of.  It is also very interesting to me to see how each professional artist will have slightly different views on the same basic laws that govern visual processes. 

One such discussion revolved around values, and the application and understanding of these properties.  I have pasted this below for the benefit of the forum.  The premise of the arguement is using an image that was altered to a grayscale version so that the viewer might use it to better understand and apply the laws of value.....

 
"When determining value in composition, transferring the image into black and white is a very useful technique of evaluating the empirical values.  It eliminates color from the image, which has the tendency to confuse the eye.  In my experience, therein lies the pitfall.  I believe that ignoring color in composition skews the overall composition. 
 
Every painting has various facets of overall composition.  The compositional elements I am aware of are 1. Form and Shape, 2. Value, 3. Color, and 4. Stroke and Edgework (depending on how loose or tight the painting is, Van Gogh used stroke extensively in formulating his compositions.) 
 
Each one of these four elements work together to form an overall composition.  A strong composition is achieved by evaluating these elements, and understanding how the elements effect the overall composition and employing them in harmony with or in contrast to the other elements of composition.  Understanding how they work together is imperative.
 
What people refer to when they are talking about a color composition, is just that, the composition of the placement of colors.  Each color draws the eye in a different way, a red colored ball would draw the eye more than a beige colored ball of the same size and value.  In this way, the color alters the composition by creating "color gravitation."  Theoretically we could eliminate the values from a painting, and come up with an image that gives us a color composition, much like we did with a black and white image showing the value composition.  When doing this we could then evaluate what colors have the greatest "pull" on our attention.  (If anyone comes up with a way to do this successfully with photoshop, let me know, lowering the contrast works to a certain extent, but alters the color at the same time.) 
 
I believe that having a solid handle on composition includes having a great handle on each one of the four compositional elements, and employing them as a whole.  Many an artist has taken the idea of "black and white values," added it to their process, and ultimately weakened their paintings in the process, because they begin ignoring the other compositional elements...especially color (form and shape are much harder to ignore.)  Whenever a composition is lacking in one of these areas, the painting suffers."
 
I hope you can benefit from this!
 
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j.b2 wrote
on 20 Nov 2009 4:53 PM

Nice expaination.

The use of B&W photos falls apart for the reasons you described..

In painting squinting for me works best for values. Quick, easy, and everyone has the tools at hand...

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eubie wrote
on 18 Dec 2009 9:42 AM

Thanks, well put and easy to understand. This is a huge step for me get a handle on..

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Antonin2 wrote
on 5 Jan 2010 2:45 PM

Wow ! Thanks for that.

I would like to add the reference of a great book about composition :

Cézannes Composition: Analysis of His Form with Diagrams and Photographs of His Motifs 

A must have and must read. 

http://antonin-paintingthemoment.blogspot.com/

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Winegarfineart wrote
on 23 Jan 2010 7:22 PM

Thanks for the tip Antonin, I will have to pick that one up!

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