Colorful Whites

Michael Georges · 05-13-2002, 10:41 PM

When painting white objects, it is tempting to just pull out the tube of white paint and go to town. However, when you begin to realize that whites reflect so much around them, mostly, white objects are only white at the highest highlights. You can create really colorful whites using almost any color and it really adds interest into your paintings.

As an example, here are a wedding couple done using an impressionistic color palette (imposing warm and cool tones), but done in a realist style. I reflected the colors of the water and the sky into the garments. The Bride's dress was slightly creamy, while the Groom' suit jacket was much whiter. Enjoy.

http://www.fineportraitsinoil.com/We...oupleSmall.jpg

Karin Wells · 05-13-2002, 11:21 PM

Your whites are delicious. They must have been fun to paint!

Michael Georges · 05-14-2002, 09:49 PM

Karin:

Thanks for the reply. Yes, they were great fun! As usual, the pic does not do the actual piece justice, but it gets the point across.

Karin Wells · 05-14-2002, 10:33 PM

I generally use raw umber + white to paint whites and then I add color (not glazes) at the end. Just curious Michael, how did/do you do it? Your painting is so successful that I can almost feel the material here...

Michael Georges · 05-14-2002, 11:36 PM

Karin:

I did the underpainting for this one in Mars Yellow. Mixed up the standard 9 values adding white on the light end and raw sienna on the dark end. Got the values just right using mostly four of them as satin is in a 4 value range, then mixed an orange, in four values, a blue in four values, and a pink in four values. Used them plus white to detail the dress over the underpainting. This wasn't like a shiny dress satin, but was slightly matte.

Thanks for the interest.