Name: Color and light
ISBN: 9780740797712

Color and light

author of the Dinotopia series, James Gurney, comes a carefully crafted and researched study on color and light in paintings. This art instruction book will accompany the acclaimed Imaginative Realism: How to Paint What Doesnâ€™t Exist. James Gurney, New York Times best-selling author and artist of the Dinotopia series, follows Imaginative Realism with his second art-instruction book, Color and Light: A Guide for the Realist Painter. A researched study on two of art's most fundamental themes, Color and Light bridges the gap between abstract theory and practical knowledge. Beginning with a survey of underappreciated masters who perfected the use of color and light, the book examines how light reveals form, the properties of color and pigments, and the wide variety of atmospheric effects. Gurney cuts though the confusing and contradictory dogma about color, testing it in the light of science and observation. A glossary, pigment index, and bibliography complete what will ultimately become an indispensible tool for any artist. This book is the second in a series based on his blog, gurneyjourney.com. His first in the series, Imaginative Realism, was widely acclaimed in the fantastical art world, and was ranked the #1 Bestseller on the Amazon list for art instruction. "James Gurney's new book, Color and Light, cleverly bridges the gap between artistic observation and scientific explanation.

What Hacker News says

skydhashAug 2025

I believe it's a cartesian production of three sets:

- What (the subject: portrait, human figure, landscape, animals,...)

- How (the medium: Drawing, painting, digital painting,...)

- Why (the objective: Study, doodling, full piece, Technical, illustrations,..)

The what is mostly a bunch of rules about anatomy, poses, perspectives, best practices...

The how is where you learn the concept of edges, values, color palettes, etc.., as well as the specificity of each medium.

The why is mostly tips and techniques.

What and How is your best bet for starting. Animation is kinda a why. So select one subject (portraint and figure drawing are really complicated), then learn the basics of one medium (I'd go with pencil). And then learn about it.

Most books focus on the subjects. The books about How generally assumes you have practiced a lot and are looking for better approach.

What I currently have on my bookshelf are:

- Figure Drawing - Design and Invention, Michael Hampton: The author also post on Youtube

- How to Render, Scott Robenson, Thomas Bertling

- How To Draw, Scott Robenson, Thomas Bertling

- Imaginative Realism, James Gurney

- Color and Light, James Gurney

- The Artist's Complete Guide to Facial Expression, Gary Faigin

- Classic Human Anatomy, Valerie Winslow

- Bridgman's Complete Guide to Drawing from Life

And a few others

- Anatomy For Sculptors, Uldis Zarins

- Anatomy of Facial Expression, Uldis Zarins

- Figure Drawing for All It's Worth, Andrew Loomis: It may be free

- Force, Michael D. Mattesi

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skydhashJul 2025

> For example, a common device that painters employ is to configure the neighboring regional contrast of a form can be light against dark on one edge and dark against light on the opposing edge.

I'm not fully sure of what you means. If we take the following example, are you talking about the neck and the collar of the girl?

https://i.pinimg.com/originals/ea/70/0b/ea700b6a0b366c13187e...

https://fr.pinterest.com/pin/453596993695189968/

I think the name of the concept is "edge control" (not really original). You can find some explanation here

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zpSlGmbUB08

To keep it short, there's no line in reality. So while you can use them when sketching, they are pretty crude, kinda like a piano with only 2 keys. The best thing is edges, meaning the delimitation between two contrasting area. If you're doing grayscale, your areas are values (light and shadow) and it's pretty easy. Once you add color, there's more dimension to play with and it became very difficult (warm and cold color, atmospheric colors, brush stroke that gives the illusion of details,...).

Again, this falls under the things that are easy to explain, but take a while to be able to observe it and longer to reproduce it.

There's a book called "Color and Light" by James Gurney that goes in depth about all of these. There's a lot of parameters that goes inside a brush stroke in a specific area of a painting.

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wirrbelJul 2024

The way traditional artists think and thought about colors is definitely not in the shape of color wheels.

Traditional artists think in terms of palettes and of mixtures of colors on the palette. They also think about colors in relation to each other. They think of layering, and about the perception of the eye.

The point is, when you discuss colors as a multi-dimensional coordinate space, you already lost (from the perspective of the painter).

Painters will explore the medium they are working in for its capabilities. Is "dark on bright" (watercolors) or "bright on dark" (soft pastel) the way to go? Can I dilute and perform washes (watercolor), or will the medium break down (acrylic).

I can only recommend James Guerney's "Color and Light" book to get impressions.

Then again, if you do digital art to scren, or if you are printing things from a computer, you need to anticipate how the devices render your colors. This is where color spaces and coordinate systems for colors and how to translate between them becomes relevant.

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JackMorganMay 2024

Wow, this is interesting, very few books I've read more than once! Even fewer are non fiction, but they sure do explain a lot about me:

- Complex PTSD: From Surviving to Thriving by Pete Walker helped me process a number of assaults that happened to me as a child

- Designing Data Intensive Applications by Martin Kleppmann helped me understand intuitively how databases work and how to use eventual consistency to handle workloads

- The Highly Sensitive Person: How To Thrive when the World Overwhelms You by Elaine Aron this helped me process my and my families neurodivergence.

- Structure And Interpretation of Computer Programs by Ableson and Sussman. Great book, it's how I learned to love Lisp. I felt like I grew 10x in skill from completing all the homework.

- Starting Strength: Basic Barbell Training by Mark Rippetoe. This is the book that got me into powerlifting as a regular part of my fitness. I used this to heal my back, neck, and wrist pain. Changed my life.

- Color and Light: A Guide for the Realist Painter by James Gurney. The GOAT of plein air painting himself teaches so much about how light works on complex forms. I've dog-eared this book.

- Reinventing Organizations by Frederic Laloux. A great look into how to build and run a self organizing team. Very insightful for when I was leading several teams and needed inspiration for something other than the typical chain of command.

- The Classroom Management Book by Harry Wong. This book taught me so much about how humans work. I still apply lessons from this book 20 years later.

- Real World Haskell by O'Sullivan, Goerzen, Stewart. This taught me a lot about Haskell, and got me into all the neat effects needed to make a function pure but still handle IO/async, etc.

- Peopleware by DeMarco, Lister. My go to book for people management and a philosophy of project management

- Science of Trust: Emotional Attunement for Couples by Gottman. I love this book for teaching me how to be a better spouse and friend.

- The Bogleheads' Guide to Investing by Larimore, Lindauer. A great guide to building a permanent portfolio that will return consistent gains with the market. Simple in hindsight, thanks to this book. Best book on investing I've ever read.

- How to Take Smart Notes by Ahrens. Introduces the zettlekasten system for thinking and creativity. Very inspiring, got me to start a personal file that I keep going to this day, five years later.

- Twenty Small Sailboats to Take you Anywhere by Vigor. I read this book over and over, dreaming of buying a small boat and sailing around the world. Maybe this year...

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woolionJan 2024

Well, that's the thing. In computer science I could recommend very good books for any subject. In art I've had to go through a lot of resources and piece information bits from everywhere.

Basically what dharmon said, and checking some of the most recommended books, like any Loomis, Gurney's Color and Light, ... Instead of Marco Bucci who's very popular on Youtube nowadays I got started with Feng Zhu, so definitely look out for different formats that would suit you best.

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woolionApr 2022

Someone else mentioned that artists at the time would have made studies (nature morte) so that they already know how to paint these objects. For the time itself, it depends on how fast he worked, etc. So I have no idea unless the process was documented.

A Chinese painter I know says his master spent one month in the mountain studying monkeys, and after that he only needed a glimpse to capture the image of one in full details. I think what matters here is that with time, your brain learns to reduce the complexity of the domain. In doing so you just have to remember a few key points (skull shape, expression, ...) that will capture the whole, most of "a monkey" being similar to another monkey, so you can reconstruct the missing pieces. Of course, a monkey is a tremendously complicated object compared to a set of glass beads, since there are many more dimensions (hairy, young, fur color, ...).

For mistakes of breaking the rules, I agree that it might have been intentional. Maybe he just made a gesture, found it to be good, and disregarded the anatomical accuracy. I was not intimate with him, so I wouldn't know. Many famous examples were not accepted as such a famous critic of the "Grande Odalisque" claimed she had three additional vertebrae compared to a normal human. Who has the best sensibility, the one who admires the painting nonetheless, or the one who sees a deformed human?

I don't know "what affects humans", or how that could separate "art" from "anything else". It did not affect contemporaries of Van Gogh, and most people who are affected by it are so after having been immersed in a culture claiming it is high-art, or facing ridicule as uneducated rubes. I believe most of the time this actually means "has some market value".

For a reference from a painter's perspective, James Gurney's "Color and light - a guide for the realist painter" is probably the current standard.

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