B&W photo
Color study
Here is one of the color studies I did yesterday. The photo in color almost looked black and white, there was so little color! But I like taking pictures of snow on an overcast day when the snow is the lightest shape in the composition. Once I turned it into black and white, I could see all kinds of possibilities that the color photo might have prevented me from using. I started the 6 x 6 color study with cool hard pastels and did an alcohol wash. The aqua I used under the snow can still be seen in the lower left corner. I mixed warms and cools over one another. The lightest light is a very light Ludwig pink, which I used sparingly. The tree forms need refinement and variation in value. But I find the overall composition and color scheme to be very pleasing and will probably move on to a larger format.
You have inspired me to turn some of my photos into black and white before I use them as a resource. I often get caught up trying to imitate what I see and that tendency can dampen creativity.
What’s amazing to me is how much my “vision” of the scene changes when I’m looking at it in black and white. The original color was really, really dull. But the black and white inspired a lot of colors in my mind. I find that I’m painting more and more from this and not from the color. Once you have done alot of painting, you know what the colors are anyway! But the black and white allows you to see beyond it.