Painting 101: Monochromatic Color Schemes

Hey, everybody!

In this video,
I'm going to show you how

to create
a monochromatic color scheme.

So what we're going to do

is just mix up some colors.

I'm going to make just a, I don't know,

yellow-green, probably.

So I'm going to grab the primaries

that I need to mix that.

And I'm going to keep them kind of close
together,

to start with.

Now, what we're creating right here
is called a "hue."

So a hue is a pure color
that is not mixed

with black, white, or gray.

And the hue is the primary part

of a monochromatic color scheme.

So if we were to break
down the word parts,

"mono" means "one"

and "chroma" means "color."

So we're creating a color scheme
with one color.

And then,
what makes it change our colors is

that we are adding black
and white to it.

And when we add white to a color,

obviously it gets lighter.

And we call that a "tint."

And then when we add black
to a color,

it's going to get darker,
and we call that a "shade."

So I'm going to start with my hue,

which is this nice yellow-green
right here,

and we're just going to create
a value scale.

So we're going to go from light to dark
across the page.

But I'm going to start
in the middle

by creating my hue right here.

So there's my first step.

Now, I need to make my tints
and my shades.

So in order to make sure
that I keep this hue consistent,

all the way across
and it doesn't change,

I'm actually going to
kind of save some of it

for my tints

and save a little extra
for my shades.

So I'm just going to
kind of scooch it over.

If you have a palette knife,
you could do that.

But otherwise,
a brush works out just fine.

So, I have hue for my tints

and hue for my shades;
they're split.

Now I can add in some white,

so we're going to make
our tints first.

So the key is we want
to keep the black and whites separate,

because if we mix the black
and white together,

black and white make gray.

And that's not a tint or a shade.

That's something called a tone.

So when I'm mixing my colors,

I keep my whites separate
from my hue,

that way I can control the amount
of white that goes into it,

instead of just squeezing it all
right into the pile of paint.

So to start, I'm going to add
just a little bit of white here.

And then I'm going to mix it
together with my hue.

So we're going to create
kind of a slow progression,

slowly getting lighter
and lighter.

And then I can...

make my next swatch here.

So that looks good.

And then I will add
a little more white to it.

And we will add our next swatch.

And we'll just continue the process,
slowly getting lighter.

Notice how I'm not washing
my brush out

between each of these mixtures.

It's is because I don't need to.

I'm using the same hue,
so it's not really changing

and I'm just slowly adding
white to it,

so it's only getting lighter.

I feel like I want
a little more difference between these.

So I'm going to just go over the top
of that one, I think.

All right.

I like when I make
a monochromatic color scheme.

I like to have a good amount
of contrast between each step.

That way,
they aren't too similar.

And back to the water.

Another thing that's really important
with water is,

water is going to dilute
your paint,

even if you dry your brush
out a little bit.

If you have water on your brush,
it will dilute it,

and...

that can make your paint lose,
kind of, saturation.

So it's not going to be as bright
and colorful.

It's going to be a little more
transparent,

which, you know, sometimes you want
that to happen.

But sometimes you don't.

And, I think, when we're working

with tempura or acrylic,

we want our paint to be a little more
on the opaque side,

because it's a lot more vibrant
and it stands out more.

Alright, so I've created my tints

and I feel like I have
a pretty good progression going

from our middle value
to our lightest values.

I could keep going
if I had more paper,

but we'll stop here for now.

So at this point,
we'll wash out our brush,

because we don't want
to contaminate our hue

with white
when we start our shades.

And I want to make sure
I dry my brush off really well,

get all that excess water out,

so that we don't water
down the paint.

And I'm going to add just a little bit
of black

onto my palette.

So it's important to remember
that black

is a very strong color.

It's overpowering,
so I do not need a lot of it.

Whereas, white is a lot weaker,

so you notice I had to go back
and add more white

to mix in
to create my lightest values.

So what I'm going to do to start is,
I'm going to take,

like, the tiniest little bit of black,
just this itty-bit,

and I'm going to mix that in.

Because it's--
you can't really go back

from it, once you mix it in,
so it's best to start small

and slowly add it in.

So I think I could probably put
in just a slight bit more.

Again, tiny, tiny amount.

And it takes over quickly,

so... kind of be on the lookout.

So that's not quite enough.

Now we see a difference.

And from here,
we'll just continue the process,

slowly adding black.

All right, so there we have it.

We have a really nice progression
from dark to light,

and it's all
with a consistent hue.

So the yellow-green stays the same

throughout the entire progression.

It only changes in value,

which is the lightness
or darkness of the color.

So the color itself does not change,
only the value changes.

And that's what makes a good
monochromatic color scheme.

Now, I had mentioned earlier

about how we don't want to mix the black
and the white together,

because it creates something called
a tone.

So if I were to mix my tints

and my shades together,

that is going to create a tone
of the yellow-green,

which really cuts down the saturation
of the color

and kind of mutes it.

So I mean,
I'm not saying never make a tone.

I'm just saying, for the purpose
that we have

of creating
this monochromatic color scheme,

it's not really
what we're looking for.

So, the more gray we add

into the color,

the less of the hue

that we actually end up seeing.

And it just becomes very muted,

very, very neutralized.

So if I were to add even more black
and white to that--

I'm going to grab a little more
white--

so that there's only just a hint
of the hue left.

As you can see,
it becomes very subtle in the gray.

So this is, again, a tone

when you mix gray with a hue.

It neutralizes your color.

All right, so that's it
for monochromatic color schemes.

Thanks for watching.