Urban Sketching:
Colour Balance & Mood
Once you can mix colour, the next question is how much to use and where. These six exercises look at the decision not to paint, working with almost no colour, using abstract colour for structure and local colour for narrative, splashing colour across the page on purpose, and how the way you feel on location ends up on the paper.
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What’s Inside
Leaving the white
Over-painting flattens everything. Wall-to-wall colour leaves nowhere for the eye to breathe, so the strategic decision not to paint is part of the watercolour stage.
Using less colour
A sketch of the back streets below the cathedral in Porto, heading down to the Ribeira, with almost no colour on purpose, because colour would take away from the textures and the stories in the windows.
Abstract and local colour
A square in Porto near the cathedral, painted looking back up the hill. It is not the choice of colour that matters most, it is how it goes on, how colours play against each other, the tonal value and where they sit.
Abstract colour in a Venice view
An elevated view over Venetian rooftops, with the campanile behind. The campanile is painted in Ultramarine Blue, which is nothing like the real warm stone, to push it back, because cool colour recedes.
Splashing colour
There are accidental splashes and conscious ones, and it is the conscious ones that matter.
Emotion and colour
A sketch of New Brighton in February, bitterly cold, with warm golds and browns around the Victorian shelter and in the foreground, balanced with Cerulean and Manganese blues. The scene was not golden.
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Questions about this bundle
What is in Urban Sketching: Colour Balance & Mood?
6 short video exercises: Leaving the white; Using less colour; Abstract and local colour; Abstract colour in a Venice view; Splashing colour; Emotion and colour. It costs £8 once and you keep lifetime access.
Do I need to have done a painting workshop first?
No. A bundle is a separate, self-contained set of exercises on one skill. If you later want to see skills like this used in a whole painting, my painting workshops do exactly that.
When can I enrol?
Enrolment opens soon. This page will show an Enrol button when it does.
Can I get a refund?
Yes, within 14 days of purchase, as long as you have not gone beyond the introduction or first lesson, because by then you have received the digital content. Email mike@artyfactor.com with the bundle name and the email you enrolled with. The full wording is in the Refund and returns policy.
How long do I have access?
It is one payment of £8 and you keep lifetime access.
Where this leads
Want to see the whole picture?
This bundle covers one skill. My painting workshops show how skills like this come together in a finished painting, one stage at a time.
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