This week Tips of the Trade: Value scale

50 shades of grey...

In drawing value scale is the fundamental. It's the shades of grey that you use to give the illusion of form with your art. In general, value scales include from 9 to 11 steps, your darkest dark being black and your lightest light being white.

In drawing and painting, I personally use a value scale of 9 shades instead of 11. I will explain why in an oncoming article.

Tinted papers

The tinted paper brings you in the middle of your scale. All you have to work is your darks and bring the highlight with white chalk. In fact, you do very little in the middle. Let the paper do its job!

Pierre-Paul Prud'hon. Study for La Source c. 1801, Black and white chalk on tinted paper

The corresponding grey in painting

Each piece of color you use has a value. I could take a black and white picture of your canvas and you would see different shades of grey.

Sounds obvious, but it's not. Colors trick the brain and make it hard to tell the value of our paint. Simply put, some colors appear darker than others.

Imprimatura

This is why we start our painting on a tinted canvas called an Imprimatura; I do put a number 4 burnt umber as my first undercoat. When you paint on a white canvas, things appears to be to dark even if they are not. I would also recommend that you work on a grey palette, not the white ones or you will have the same problems. It is always easier to judge value when you put yourself in the middle than if you stand on the far side of the scale.

David Leffel, "The Art of Painting", Oil painting DVD

Happy Painting!