Need help with colour!

Thomas Barber

Double Actioner
I recently invested in some colour paints as i felt it was time to further myself. I brought some wicked detail primaries and normal wicked. Now correct me if im wrong but i seen the detail range as transparent and the normal wicked range as opaque. I've watched all the airbrush tutor tutorials that mention colour and i have read dru blairs colour buffer theory too, they are clear tutorials dont get me wrong but i just feel like im asking, why?. Theres a lot of techniques i have discovered out there but its becoming rather confusing and overwhelming. i basically want some answers...
I want to know if, people use just transparent and why,
if people mix transparent with opaque and why,
i want to know if when using transparent, do you mix a base tone and mid tone or do you just build up on top of the base with other colours to make the base pop and build up (a bit like steve drisco's tutoral),
Or if you haven't got answers to my individual questions just tell me your approach and little characteristics you have found.
How do you colour match to your reference?
I know a lot of you will give totally different answers but i think if i know i bunch of ways i can find a way that will work for me.
please clear up this colourful mess.
Cheers!
 
i have had the same problem,, and there a lot of guys on here could tell you better...marissa just recently wrote a great article on this in the thread transparent vs opaques..just look around and follow the basic rules and find a technique that fits you because everyone has there own way of doing things and in the end you will find your own way that suits you..
 
i have had the same problem,, and there a lot of guys on here could tell you better...marissa just recently wrote a great article on this in the thread transparent vs opaques..just look around and follow the basic rules and find a technique that fits you because everyone has there own way of doing things and in the end you will find your own way that suits you..

i found the tread Ran your right it was very useful to read, i saved it as a document to reflect on. I'm ready to get back in the ring with my airbrush..
 
ive been doing a lot of research on this subject and what i have determined is that is best to start out wiht the three primary colors red, yellow and blue,, and mix all the colors you need from this... plus white and black to tint and shade, after you have got that down you can add one other color until you work you pallete up to what you understand.. but the biggest thing is to learn the basics... everything on color is based on the basics like anything else your trying to learn,, start simple and work your way up, it takes time but it is worth it... like i have said before airbrushing is easy,, what is complicated it the use of color,, once you get that mastered you can do pretty much what you want.
 
Will give ya my take on your questions m8, though no doubt theres no real right or wrong methods..BTW Much of what I'm gonna suggest as with some of the mentioned techniques mentioned in ya post have been handed down to us through art itself, theres no real new theorys when it comes to airbrushing so perhaps a good place for some reading references is good ol' artbooks..Dru's theorys, as with Marissa's, Mitches, my own and a million other artists simply have borrowed and adapted what came before....ultimately its just what each calls it that makes it different :)

I want to know if, people use just transparent and why,

If your a watercolourist as my background comes from you'll enjoy utilizing the white of your canvas and will enjoy the brightness a finished transparent piece can obtain that imo an opaque kind of ruins, it just feels and appears lighter and brighter, but thats just a personal taste thing, one issue with opaques is they become chalky looking due to the white that's in it, you will here a lot of peeps say don't use transparents if you want realism, that's hogwash imo, transparents look grainy due to the fact that we are atomizing the paint, so in essence a light spray will leave white gaps in between the pigment, opaque actually does this aswell when you look at it closly, its just not as obvious, these white gaps can be overcome by re-layering the transparent to fill in the spaces, saying that though we know that overlaying transparents gets darker in color as we go, we can avoid this by starting of with a lighter shade and help remove a lot of that grainy look..Ultimately transparents are more of a challenge as colour mixing also takes place on the canvas and you have to be aware if you want to avoid graineness to start of with a lighter shade of the color you want to match and build it up slowly..

if people mix transparent with opaque and why
..yes some do but I don't see the point personally, not in the cup at least..Ultimately adding transparent to a cup of opaque will just turn your opaque color to a more intense version of that opaque color, add enough though and your heading towards a semi-opaque, but this can also be done by reducing an opaque and is much cheaper on your paint supplys..On the canvas though Hell yer, this is due back to that idea of chalkiness, a lot of artists will do their base painting in opaque and then add transparent layers over the top to add dimension, depth and of course for blending and to remove that chalky look, a very good system to get used to, as unlike transparent paintings, starting off with opaques allows you to fix any issues and the color will only reach a certain intensity of color IE It will only go so dark no matter how much more you spray it..

i want to know if when using transparent, do you mix a base tone and mid tone or do you just build up on top of the base with other colors to make the base pop and build up (a bit like steve drisco's tutoral),

Not sure on that tutorial m8 but mixing transparents its a very good idea to start with your lightest color and then add your darker colors to it in very small quantities, a small bit goes a long way and you'll waste a crapload of paint doing it the other way..and remember the pint I made before about it getting darker the more layers you add, this can also be used to your advantage, more so than opaques though similar is possible. One transparent color has a very large range of color tone available..


How do you colour match to your reference?

many do this by using a clear film and placing this over your reference, then dabbing their color that they have mixed on that plastic surface and checking consistency of color on the reference below. Using trans it can be a bit harder and ultimately practice is the key as its more of a case of knowing what layering will achieve, this includes finishing of an opaque base, I would suggest doing your opaque base in a lighter tone than the reference shows, knowing what overlaying a transparent will later do to this color, otherwise you cld end up with very dark paintings..For this practice though I strongly recommend using a simple diary and writing your color mixes down and create your own tonal value charts, also do a set of charts with an opaque base but with different transparents added over it, always take very good notes..This is critical as if you do run out of paint half way through it enables you to mix this color exactly as needed without guesswork..

A couple extra points- When painting with transparents you really have to go from light to dark, little else will work, try to be minimalistic around highlights leaving that white of the canvas to shine through as the actual highlight, as adding white later kind of removes the point to using transparent only..

experiment with semi-opaques aswell, in realistic terms these are just reduced opaques but have a lot of advatages, it may be harder to fix or cover mistakes but they allow some of the base layer to come through, as do over reduced opaques so either or for that, I certainally wouldnt suggest spending a lot of money on em..

Opaques really can be done either way, light to dark or dark to light though if you make a mistake on your darks don't try to blot it out with a light, instead go back through your tones and gradually lighten the mistake, this will help avoid pesky color shift..

As rand said, buy a set of transparent primarys, but also buy a set of each a warm set and a cool set, also make sure ya have a crapload of white..Use these transparents then to make your opaques, then use your opaques to make semi-opaques, be sure though to always leave some pure transparents aswell, so the bigger the bottle you can buy, the better..

Theres a million and one other points in regards to color theory but I hope its answered some of your questions, I really suggest though you go out and get yourself some good oil/watercolor painting books as this will explain things such as color harmonising, gamuts, localised color, warm and cool colors and why each is used,and likely a million other things I've neglected to mention...:)

Sorry bout the read but such questions are hard to explain in such a short reply LOL..GL
 
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@Rebelair, your position with us is seriously underrated, it's incredible that you give so much of your own time to help others, thanks mate, and I think that goes for everyone who benefit from your insight.

P.S. And then you apologise for it, lol
 
well this is definitely reassuring to read all this, i haven't exhausted my options thats for sure!

one final question i have then referring to what a few of you have mention. using transparent primaries and white and black. where does transparent white come into use normally?
 
Its kind of an oxymoron for me as white in my eyes is always opaque or semi opaque to some degree, its just the nature of the white pigment, transparent white as I'm sure some manufacturers may call it is just an over reduced opaque white, perhaps with more binding agents or a different formula so it doesn't go through pigment binder breakdown (As can happen when you over reduce any color), and or could be made out of a slightly different white pigment. (In the oils world)

You can use over reduced opaque white for a few good reasons, first is that it will generally spray nicer as full strength opaque white commonly will tip dry, I think this is because they have to use a lot of pigment to create a white and this helps block guns and cause tip dry issues.. Its great for allowing some base layer to come through, especially around highlights, it mainly just allows you to build these highlights up slowly to give you a more natural look of the area gradually lightening rather than looking like a solid blob of white on the canvas and it still allows some of the initial color to come through..It can also be used to soften other tones and create pastals, of course the same applies with blue shift but this is also reduced somewhat but I'd still want to be careful going over really dark colors...I personally find it really useful to use in a situation that your using a dark canvas and you want to build up the initial white layers nice and slow, this way when you tint it later with other transparents they to will take on a different shade, some do this when it comes to painting fire, by continually overlaying it it basically acts like a transparent/semi opaque and gradually gets whiter as you add more layers, thus creating many tones of white..
 
I mentioned in my previous post that a lot of this info comes from the traditional art world and I think its really important that all airbrush artists study this, if you want to learn more about transparent overlay it helps to study watercolor, suss out some water color videos on the tube and/or try to find water color tutorials, with opaques its useful to study oil and acrylic painting (They also use washes which is similar to how we use transparents to finish a painting), again the tube may have some useful demos as ultimately airbrushing methods really are an extension of traditional methods, we can view any tutorial say on building up a watercolor or oil/acrylic brushed work and utilize the exact same principles and layering system with the airbrush, the only change is the tool in our hand, Also I have linked a VERY useful resource site below, this site has free E-Books (I believe, though haven't downloaded such) that explains many fundementals such as color theory etc and has many topics, blogs and forums to help with such-GL

Artist Daily
 
I took Dru Blair's photo realism class back in March and I was attempting to try and remember Dru's explanation and answer to your question, but instead of giving you second hand information, here is a link to the information directly from Dru. Now Dru posted this on another forum, so please don't hate me for posting it, but this is very valuable information for anyone who's interested in color theory and opaques vs. transparents.
Transparents vs Opaques
 
"Opaques really can be done either way, light to dark or dark to light though if you make a mistake on your darks don't try to blot it out with a light, instead go back through your tones and gradually lighten the mistake, this will help avoid pesky color shift.."

Rebel, I just noticed this in your previous explanation regarding opaques and I'm a bit confused. I always paint light to dark with opaques, otherwise you invoke the blue shift if you spray dark over light, especially with warm colors. How do you gradually lighten mistakes without using a correcting opaque color? The only way I know of is to use an aggressive eraser and eraser = texture, unless you erase all the way down to the substrate or by chance you are looking to achieve some texture. I may have misunderstood your explanation and I'm hoping you can set me straight regarding this.
 
"Opaques really can be done either way, light to dark or dark to light though if you make a mistake on your darks don't try to blot it out with a light, instead go back through your tones and gradually lighten the mistake, this will help avoid pesky color shift.."

Rebel, I just noticed this in your previous explanation regarding opaques and I'm a bit confused. I always paint light to dark with opaques, otherwise you invoke the blue shift if you spray dark over light, especially with warm colors. How do you gradually lighten mistakes without using a correcting opaque color? The only way I know of is to use an aggressive eraser and eraser = texture, unless you erase all the way down to the substrate or by chance you are looking to achieve some texture. I may have misunderstood your explanation and I'm hoping you can set me straight regarding this.

Hey JT, i kinda understand it like he means if you went from light to dark like in 3 layers and you wanna fix a mistake in the dark you have to go back in the reverse way all the 3 layers instead of putting on just the lightest
color again to correct it. I might also understand it wrong and Rebel will correct it himself :) .
 
I always paint light to dark with opaques

Why? opps I must have missed that rule in the artists handbook, only joshing m8, when it comes to opaques it really doesn't matter, starting with your darks can be useful as you don't loose your reference lines, and ultimately its rare for a highlight to be right next to a shadow so color shift shouldn't be a huge issue. I would suggest though to revisit the darks at the end to remove any light overspray..Generally though I start of with my mid tone, I do this so I can work a light and dark texture into it, personally I've found it just saves time and a few extra layers, though there's nothing wrong with painting light to dark either...This obviously is only really an issue with greyscale or black and white pics, when using color opaques, color shift isn't as much of a problem as we generally use a gamut of similar colors...really its your art so its your choice, but try not to get stuck in the same groove, experiment with throwing out that rule book and see what it can achieve as the artists that generally get noticed are those that break from convention..

And Stranger was on the right track, most beginners when they make a mistake jump straight to their lightest color to try and repair this, I made this comment more in passing as when it comes to color again it really isn't an issue, but yer on greyscale work you want to go back through the tones slowly as this will help reduce that immediate shift of the overspray, or at least mask of the area around it if you want to go in with a really light color...When it comes to "rules in art" the only fun thing to do is to find ways around em LOL

I re-read the article you posted and I found quite a few points I disagree with LOL, but that's the beauty of art, there's many ways to skin a cat and no-one person is always right, or we just see things in a different way, but ultimately I would want to encourage peeps to use both transparents and opaques rather than comparing them againts each other as each has its benefits and downsides.

BTW I'm not a big fan of erasing mistakes or erasing full stop, I see some awesome work being done this way but its not something I play around with too much, ultimately its easier just not to make mistakes in the first place and when it comes to highlighting I generally like to leave the white of my canvas rather than erasing it back in, but again that's just a personal choice thing, either way similar outcomes can be obtained and either method again has its ups and downs LOL

..and btw I have no idea what your saying when using the term a correcting opaque color, as ultimately opaques will cover anything underneath when sprayed to its full intensity, its what there designed to do, its the overspray that generally causes most of our shift issues...If you mask of an area around a mistake you cld literally re-spray it white, build up your layers again, remove the mask and blend it in and not see the fix, there really is a lot of ways to tackle this aspect...

I hope that makes it as clear as mud LOL, bit off topic but may answer some unasked questions :)
 
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I mentioned in my previous post that a lot of this info comes from the traditional art world and I think its really important that all airbrush artists study this, if you want to learn more about transparent overlay it helps to study watercolor, suss out some water color videos on the tube and/or try to find water color tutorials, with opaques its useful to study oil and acrylic painting (They also use washes which is similar to how we use transparents to finish a painting), again the tube may have some useful demos as ultimately airbrushing methods really are an extension of traditional methods, we can view any tutorial say on building up a watercolor or oil/acrylic brushed work and utilize the exact same principles and layering system with the airbrush, the only change is the tool in our hand, Also I have linked a VERY useful resource site below, this site has free E-Books (I believe, though haven't downloaded such) that explains many fundementals such as color theory etc and has many topics, blogs and forums to help with such-GL

Artist Daily

Well definitely thanks for the tips there rebel, luckily i'm at an arts university at the minute with a fabulous library so i have the resources to read into these topics. Will find my self distracted by this for a while i feel.
 
Why? opps I must have missed that rule in the artists handbook, only joshing m8, when it comes to opaques it really doesn't matter, starting with your darks can be useful as you don't loose your reference lines, and ultimately its rare for a highlight to be right next to a shadow so color shift shouldn't be a huge issue. I would suggest though to revisit the darks at the end to remove any light overspray..Generally though I start of with my mid tone, I do this so I can work a light and dark texture into it, personally I've found it just saves time and a few extra layers, though there's nothing wrong with painting light to dark either...This obviously is only really an issue with greyscale or black and white pics, when using color opaques, color shift isn't as much of a problem as we generally use a gamut of similar colors...really its your art so its your choice, but try not to get stuck in the same groove, experiment with throwing out that rule book and see what it can achieve as the artists that generally get noticed are those that break from convention..

And Stranger was on the right track, most beginners when they make a mistake jump straight to their lightest color to try and repair this, I made this comment more in passing as when it comes to color again it really isn't an issue, but yer on greyscale work you want to go back through the tones slowly as this will help reduce that immediate shift of the overspray, or at least mask of the area around it if you want to go in with a really light color...When it comes to "rules in art" the only fun thing to do is to find ways around em LOL

I re-read the article you posted and I found quite a few points I disagree with LOL, but that's the beauty of art, there's many ways to skin a cat and no-one person is always right, or we just see things in a different way, but ultimately I would want to encourage peeps to use both transparents and opaques rather than comparing them againts each other as each has its benefits and downsides.

BTW I'm not a big fan of erasing mistakes or erasing full stop, I see some awesome work being done this way but its not something I play around with too much, ultimately its easier just not to make mistakes in the first place and when it comes to highlighting I generally like to leave the white of my canvas rather than erasing it back in, but again that's just a personal choice thing, either way similar outcomes can be obtained and either method again has its ups and downs LOL

..and btw I have no idea what your saying when using the term a correcting opaque color, as ultimately opaques will cover anything underneath when sprayed to its full intensity, its what there designed to do, its the overspray that generally causes most of our shift issues...If you mask of an area around a mistake you cld literally re-spray it white, build up your layers again, remove the mask and blend it in and not see the fix, there really is a lot of ways to tackle this aspect...

I hope that makes it as clear as mud LOL, bit off topic but may answer some unasked questions :)

Rebel, thanks for your explanation. No offense, but I don't totally agree with everything you're saying here. I agree there is a lot to be learned by studying the classic techniques used by hairy brush water color and oil painters, but there are inherent differences when using an airbrush that create unique situations. I painted with oils for years and never encountered something called the blue shift. This is unique to airbrush painting because of the way it atomizes and applies the paint is such a fine, thin layer. I'm not saying you always have to spray opaques light to dark all the time, but in general, for your larger areas of coverage, you do. To go back and put in small areas of texture, like Mitch did in the Denise portrait works because he mixed the flesh color with white to counter act the blue shift, i.e.: a correcting color. As far as repair mistakes, how do you mask around a mistake and not have the tape line show through? I realize on some subjects, like a zombie or skull, it won't matter and I agree that is a good approach in these cases, but what about a female portrait like Denise? I'm pretty confident the tape line will show and look like she has bad skin or popped a zit. As you say, and I agree, there's more than one way to skin a cat, but some thing are what they are. Oh, and I don't only use opaques. I use transparents just as much. I'm always looking to learn new techniques and methods, which is why I visit forums such as this, and that's why I appreciate your feedback and hopefully you appreciate mine.
 
I appreciate your feedback and hopefully you appreciate mine.

Of course I do m8, it would be a boring world if we all agreed, and being art there's always going to be opposing differences, but I'll respond to the points ya made as they are good points, the problem is with trying to squeeze this kind of theory into a post is extremely hard, in fact a novel length post would prob still fall short on some points..So get ready for another long post LOL

inherent differences when using an airbrush that create unique situations

Of course there is, the point I was making was how a painting is constructed is pretty much the same methods/layers as u wld use with a brush. Atomizing the paint has a different effect but ultimately for me the actual layering process is just the same, so is the paint mixing and color theory aspect, so is the canvases we use, so on and so on... (Even oils/watercolor can be done differently of course, as can airbrush layering), and , I was trying to make the point that if you want to use transparent overlay-Study watercolor, and if you mainly want to paint in opaques-Study Oil/Acrylic as it will give you a good base in understanding how to create similar artworks with the airbrush..The look and feel may vary as one has a smooth transition in most parts (The airbrush) and one will have harder edges unless you know how to blend well with washes, and of course one will have brushmarks and one has overspray etc etc..:)

I painted with oils for years and never encountered something called the blue shift

You likely won't as blue shift comes from not taking your white you overlay over the black to its full intensity as a brush will generally do. Besides that point not all blacks are blue based, some are red based and some are green based, especially in the oil and watercolor world. Adding to that point watercolourists and oil painters rarely use a true black in their work..If they did and then added a lightwash of white, they to would see some kind of color shift, though no oil painter or watercolourist would do this..Most of our blue shift in airbrushing comes from overspray, not from a 100% intensity white layer going over a black layer, if using opaques and you do this it would cover the black with enough layering and the shift would occur on the overspray, not the new white layer..

but in general, for your larger areas of coverage, you do

Ahh but again you don't have to, because you choose to is a choice, I never have yet and I can come up with the same end result? Its def a way to approach it, but its not the only way, larger all smaller..The only exception to this for me is in transparent overlay, in this its hard to do anything but light to dark..

like Mitch did in the Denise portrait works because he mixed the flesh color with white to counter act the blue shift

Why would you get blue shift in flesh tone if no black is involved?..Personally I haven't watched Mitches video on this, but if using flesh tones as a base and then if and you texture with flesh tones, blue shift wouldn't be an issue anyway, unless of course a color your using is based on blue, besides a pic of an avatar character or a smurf, I dn't think this is an issue. Color portraits generally involve a similar gamut of colors, in essence 90% of the time they are the same color of different tones and rarely would you want to use black in there anyway, even for shadows, again sorry I don't understand this statement as I have never had any shift issues when using basically the same color over the same color (even though they are a different tone or shade, pending on what you like to call it), even if a bit of white is added..Its the black that generally creates this shift issue and as explained above, this is because black is generally blue based. If your adding black to these colors I would suggest its not a good idea :) Still can't see why this is called a correcting color, its a tone your using to create texture, its not correcting anything?

how do you mask around a mistake and not have the tape line show through?

Ahhh, finally an easy one LOL..Your correct in thinking this would occur but done correctly in practice its no issue, simply mask of a fair area around the mistake (Its the overspray we want it to reduce so overspray doesn't drift onto shaded or dark area's and possibly shift, again this entirely depends on your palete of color)..the idea isn't to spray a heavy base coat back in, you blot out the error and feather the layer off before reaching the mask edge. You will get a slight overspray edge, but this is nothing that can't be blended out as theres no real physical edge to it as there would be if you heavily base the whole area..Again not something I prob explained well in my original posts..and yes it works well on any repair when done correctly, color or B&W, as long as you do the repair whilst still in the opaque ranges of paint, if you've sprayed your transparent it becomes a lot harder to blend it back in as the transparents intensitys are hard to rematch..

there's more than one way to skin a cat, but some thing are what they are

Sorry I wholeheartedly disagree with this statement..If things just are as they are, art would never advance because we'd always find that end point, again its those that dare to break convention imo that get noticed, and I've said it once I'll say it again...there are no rules in art, I have little issue with someone sticking to the rules, as they are suggested as guidelines and in most cases work, but I get more joy in seeing a beginner or an experianced painter bending and breaking these rules, hell would we even have modernism or cubism if this was the case or would we all still be painting landscapes ;)...


M8, honestly I appreciate being questioned and in no way do I think I'm right, nor do I doubt at some point I've accidently mislead or made a mistake, its the nature of short posts and forums when realistically these thoughts need a lot more explaining to really convey the thought..Here's another metaphor though to end with- there is no right in art, only what you want to do LOL

PS-Sorry Thomas, bit off topic LOL :0
 
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