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Wednesday, April 25, 2018

A Great Subject for Exploring Color Temperature

'Miles of Poppies'         8x10        pastel         ©Karen Margulis
available $145
Color temperature is a concept that didn't come easily for me. It was like value....I thought I knew what it was but I didn't really see it. I would wonder what all the fuss was about. Why did I need to see and understand color temperature? Looking back I realize that it was a concept that I wasn't ready to master. My brain was busy on other painting concepts. After all there is only so much we can 'get' at one time. It eventually clicked.

We are working on color temperature this week on my Patreon page. One of the suggestions I shared was to take each color family and pull all of the pastels of that color out of your box. Then take some time to arrange the pastels into piles of warm and cool. Sometimes it is easier to judge the temperature of a pastel when it is a part of a group.  In the photo below you can see how I arranged the red and green pastel by temperature.

I arranged my pastels from cool to warm before I started painting
Some subjects make good use of color temperature. A landscape with depth is a great example. To create the illusion of depth one of the things that we need to do is make sure we use cooler colors in the distance. A meadow filled with red flowers can be a challenge. How do you make both warm and cool colors recede? In my poppy meadow I used cooler lighter greens in the distance and duller cooler reds for the distant poppies. Having the pastels arranged in my tray helped me stay on track with color temperature.

I share mark making and color temperature tips in my latest video demo
If you would like to see the development of this painting you can see the video on my Patreon page. It is just $4 a month and you can cancel at any time! Come join us! In May we will be exploring Plein air with pastels. www.patreon.com/karenmargulis

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