Coloring Tutorial

The color scheme an artist uses applies to the tone they won't to set in the image or scene. Dark grays and browns imply mystery and fear. Bright pastel colors represent warmth and happiness. Faded colors represent age, abandonment, and isolation.

Colors are important because they play a key part in displaying the story and nature behind the artwork. 

The first step of understanding color is to understand shading: the darkening of an illustration. 

Darkening pieces of an illustration helps show the shadows of the curves and corners of the image. It shows depth. To understand where to shade dark, one must first identify from which angle the light source is coming from. The parts of the picture blocked from this light source will be the darkest.

This also works for colors as well. You can shade an image with a specific color by using the brightest and darling forms of those colors. 

In scenes with multiple colors, you must develop a color scheme. The colors you use must coordinate in a specific way that goes along with the tone of your image. 

These are some examples of color schemes I have used to create moods. 

This is an image of a tall building. By using dark blues and grays to create the view of a dark and stormy night. 

At the top of this image shows the color scheme I used for this landscape. The calm and warm colors are supposed to show a peaceful, sunny day.