We at the blog have declared August to be Colorful Shadows Month! We’re challenging ourselves to paint shadows more colorfully. Whether you are in the heat and direct sunlight of summer in the northern hemisphere or have the opportunity observe winter snow in the southern, August should be a great month to observe shadows.
To kick us off, I thought I would compile some of the information I’ve collected through book-learnin’ about how to make color choices about shadows.
Realizing the Color in Shadows – Nita Leland
In Exploring Color Workshop, Nita Leland suggests using shadows as an opportunity to make design choices for the overall scene.
Think of shadows as a transparent veil through which you can see the color of the surface they lie on, slightly darker in value than the surface, but not black and never opaque. Shadows needn’t be neutral. Use a deeper value of the surface color, colors complementary to the dominant light illuminating the scene, or creative color that strengthens color effect, not just cool blue or violet.
Nita Leland, Exploring Color Workshop 30th Anniversary Edition, p. 139: “Realizing the Color in Shadows”
Leland makes two important points here:
- Shadows are translucent: you can see the local color of the object and the color of the shadow at the same time. This makes glazing a good technique in watercolor.
- Even though shadows may appear neutral gray in real life, you can make artistic choices about what color you want the shadows to be based on the overall design needs of the painting and the statement you want to make.
For example, in this scene by Nita Leland, she uses bold red shadows to increase the warmth of the scene.
Leland shows examples from Jean Grastorf, who uses a unique pouring technique to create prismatic shadows.
Reflected Light – James Gurney
James Gurney takes a more scientific approach to understand what colors we can expect shadows to contain based on surrounding conditions. From the “Reflected Light” section from James Gurney’s book, Color and Light:
Just as the moon reflects the light of the sun into our night landscape, every object in a scene that receives strong light becomes its own source of light. Therefore, any nearby area of shadow will be affected by it.
James Gurney, Color and Light, p. 66: “Reflected Light”
Test reflected light at home! Choose something brightly-colored, like a tomato. Arrange the lighting so the tomato is brightly lit, but there are shadows nearby. The tomato will reflect red-orange light into the shadow. (You will see it best if you use a white background. It will be strongest very close to the tomato.)
Shadows on the ground outside are blue when they’re reflecting the blue sky, as I observed in Nature Notebook: Snow!
Next time you’re outside on a day with a blue sky, look at shadows on the ground, facing the open sky, vs. the shadows on the ceiling of a porch or the underside of tree branches, which face the ground.
For example, in this scene by James Gurney, “Millbrook Library,” the shadows on the outside of the columns facing the street are blue-violet, while those inside of the columns facing the building and under the overhang are brown, facing the building/ground.
For a more classical example, see how John Singer Sargent shifts between warm and cool shadows on the different planes of the white building. We can’t see the context outside the frame, but one can imagine the bluer side faces out toward the sea and sky, while the warmer side faces toward the trees creating that interplay of dappled light.
Gurney offers these “conclusions about reflected light”:
- In shadows, upfacing planes are cool, and downfacing planes are warm.
- Reflected light falls of quickly as you get farther from the source, unless the source is very large (such as a lawn).
- The effect is clearest if you remove other sources of reflected and fill light.
- The color of the shadow is the sum of all the sources of reflected illumination, combined with the local color of the object itself.
- On a sunny day, vertical surfaces in shadow usually receive two sources of illumination: warm ground light and blue sky light.
Whoof! That’s a lot to think about.
The good news is that you don’t necessarily need to know how it works to observe what you see. But I think it’s useful to know the theory because it helps to disrupt the idea that shadows are gray. And it helps you to improvise convincingly!
Tips for Colorful Shadows Month
Collect shadow inspo
We don’t normally post other artists’ work much (other than the authors of the blog posts), but I have done so in this post to show some inspiring ways to use shadow. Make your own image collection if you see an artist using shadow interestingly. What did they do there? Why did they make that choice? What can you tell about time of day, time of year, weather conditions, or the emotion of the scene from the way the shadows look?
Look for natural color variation within shadows
Notice the difference between upfacing and downfacing shadows, or shadows facing in different directions, or shadows closer or further from the object casting the shadow, or edges vs. centers of shadows.
Don’t be afraid to exaggerate any differences you see in your painting. The differences between shadow colors in reality may be fairly subtle, but this is one of those areas where an exaggeration can make a scene feel “more real.”
Make observations from life
Make observations from life, where possible. Cameras are bad at capturing the subtle colors of shadows. They’re not optimized for it since it’s something most people don’t care about, so they’ll tend to either prioritize the light area (darkening the shadow to black) or prioritize detail within the dark shadows (blowing out highlights and flattening away shadows). Cameras will also try to white-balance everything, turning shadows as neutral as possible.
Sketching from life lets you capture your subjective impressions. Even if you don’t do a full-scale painting from life, it’s helpful to capture your impressions of the shadows in a small sketch, or even just some nature spots.
Go with your gut. I sometimes find that the longer I look at a shadow, the less sure I am of what color it is. My first impression is more emotionally & perceptually accurate. Refresh your first impression by looking away for awhile, then quickly glancing back.
…or consider some clever reference photo editing
If you take reference photos to use later, consider taking two photos – one to capture the highlights with the shadow darkened, and one to capture the shadow with the highlights blown out.
You might also boost the vibrance and/or saturation of your reference photos. You don’t need to paint the whole scene oversaturated, but you can use it as a reference for the shadows only. For example, boosting the saturation of the photo below revealed the grayish shadow to be distinctly blue.
(Though I have to say, in real life, the shadows didn’t look that turquoise – they looked more of a mid to violet blue, not as gray as on the left nor as cyan as on the right. So, nature spots from life would still have been helpful.)
Use shadows as design elements
What if you ignored the color the shadows are made them the color you want them to be?
You might choose shadow colors that enhance the design of your overall scene. For example, choose violet shadows to make lit areas look yellower. Or like Jean Grastorf and Deb Ward, above, you add some fun prismatic color shifts.
What if you just kinda drop some random color in there?
Let’s have fun with shadows!
Looking for shadow inspo? Check out my photos tagged “shadows” on Paint My Photo.