How to Develop an Eye for Color (for Oil Painters)

[@ChelseaLang]

If you want my help to loosen up your oil paintings, you can book a free painting consultation with me here: bit.ly/4dM6xrO

[@lyndajoyce6243]

You are such a wonderful painter and teacher! Thank you so much!

[@tbm7187]

Excellent idea! Thanks so much Chelsea!

[@artssandra]

What a fantastic idea thanks Chelsea.

[@ChantelleArts]

this is incredible ☺☺

[@danielmathers-i5k]

Wow… really good video. Thanks

[@mayukhbanerjee1147]

How to know what colours to use to make the colour you already mixed closer to the reference colour? Like how do you know mixing this yellow will make it more green or something like that; Especially if you gave partial colour blindness ? If someone can help it'll be really kind

[@ChelseaLang]

A lot of it is intuition at this point, but the intuition comes from doing enough repetitions of an exercise like this, where it allows me to build up a really solid understanding of my palette so that I will eventually just instinctively reach for certain colors. As for color blindness, I wish I could weigh in further here but I just don't have enough expertise in that area to confidently guide you. But if I find a resource I'll make a note to send you another reply!

[@craft-o-matic399]

Do you do this right before you begin the painting? Thank you so much! Lisa

[@ChelseaLang]

Thanks for your question Lisa, it's a great one! So, if you have the time and energy, yes, you could do it just before you begin, or use it during the painting to simply check your color mixtures for the final piece. :) If not, you could do it as a separate exercise. You may not be able to reuse the paint mixtures, but if you practice enough you will eventually find that you intuitively just mix the right color from memory/intuition.

[@stephanieashworth6317]

Paint chips! What a great idea;-)

[@craft-o-matic399]

In the case of his jacket, I thought you would mix the yellow with its compliment for the cast shadow?

[@ChelseaLang]

Ooo, another good question! So I try to stay away from that kind of formula. I find there are simply too many instances where it just doesn't apply, and it can quickly become confusing for someone still looking to master color. Instead, I just focus on matching what I see, and in a case like the jacket shadow, it's easiest to use existing colors for context, or maybe start with a color that's overall pretty neutral as my jumping off point. Does this help?

[@craft-o-matic399]

@@ChelseaLang I'm a longtime follower of Helen Van Wyk, and that's the way she always did it. I just finished my first portrait drawing in pencil. Soon I will begin my first oil painting of the same. From scratch. I was curious, and since it's not a study of someone else's work, I was curious. Thank you so much! Lisa