Restricted palette

[Tony Robinson]

Ok, if anyone fancies another project following the success of the Scannell Challenge, how about trying a restricted palette?

• Perhaps do one painting using just Black and White (or another monochrome colour),
  
• one using 2 colours., warm and cool - for example, Ultramarine and Light Red (or similar) plus White,
  
• and a third with these colours plus Lemon Yellow (or Cadmium Pale), or try the Anders Zorn palette which was Cadmium Red Light, Yellow Ochre, Black and White. 

Just a thought, like.
Anyone fancy trying this?

For more on the potential benefits of this austere approach: Gurney Blog and Robert Simone's Blog

[Tony Robinson]

Wow, those are great Kathryn. I haven't tackled it myself yet and can't wait to have a go at the weekend after seeing those. I'm sure Kevin Freeney will want to highlight some of our efforts when everyone who wants to has given this idea a try. So perhaps you will post them on here directly when you get time?
Great nude study, Tom. I'm doing more charcoal drawing lately and it is pleasant to concentrate just on tone for a while.

Note to all posters: (afraid I got it wrong myself in an earlier post!)
To save the thread from becoming long and repetitious, if you don't want the last poster's post to be repeated all the way down the thread, don't click indented 'Reply to This', but instead click on the one below that on the left hand edge.

[Elaine Hurst]

I love the paintings, Katherine. Especially the one "Zangle Cove #3". Tom, wonderful nude, well done!

[Kathryn Townsend]

Here are the first four sketches. I chose a simple subject--the bank of the Cove across from my house. I made the size small in order to stay in "exercise" mode.

6/1/10 "Zangle Cove #1", 5" x 7", Oil, Palette: Titanium White and Ivory Black

6/1/10 "Zangle Cove #2", 5" x 7", Oil, Palette: Venetian Red, Ultramarine Blue, Titanium White. Love the way earth reds harmonize with ultramine blue.

6/1/10 "Zangle Cove #3", 5" x 9", Oil, Palette: Ultramarine, Cad Yellow Light, Venetian Red, Titanium White. Tide had gone way out by the time I got to this one, so I changed the composition.

6/1/10 "Zangle Cove #4", 5" x 7", Oil, Palette: Cad Red Light, Yellow Ochre, Titanium White, Ivory Black. Tide had come back in! Amazing what luminous colors can be created with this simple palette.

Interesting -- my values in the black and white were definitely better than #2 when I looked at #2 in grey scale. That's a good thing to find out! I'm doing some additional studies with other palettes which I'll post next week. You can see some of them at
http://kathryntownsend.blogspot.com.

[Karen Scannell]

I spent yesterday afternoon getting to grips with this challenge. After doing a number of prelim. sketches,I finally "settled" down . Blurred my eyes to get the various planes and tone simplified and then used the tonal value scale to isolate each tonal value.

[Karen Scannell]

Then got to work on each palette...I wasn't working as free and loose as I'd like...but then this is an exercise.

[Karen Scannell]

When I finished the three, I looked at them all in black and white to see how close they were to each other. Thanks Tony for the project...definitely made me stop and think!!!

[Elaine Hurst]

Thanks, Karen for sharing all those images. That is really nice to see them together, and to see the steps you took.

I am way behind on this challenge. I have been busy with lots of other things. I may not make the deadline, but I am going to do the last two paintings as soon as I can. Great exercise.

[Elaine Hurst]

Sorry I didn't make it to finish up this challenge. I had great plans to do it, and then life got in the way. I will work on it sometime in the near future to challenge myself. I enjoyed seeing everyone else's works.