Shadow colours for painters

Abstract

This article presents a simple, practical method for painting realistic shadow colours. The method involves the Munsell colour system. A straight line is drawn on the Munsell hue leaf, whose hue is that of the object being painted. The line starts at the Munsell specification of the object’s colour (when viewed in full light), and ends one value step below N0, on the neutral axis. The colours on this line are the colours of the object in various degrees of shadow. The Reilly paint mixing approach is presented as an intuitive way for a painter to mix these colours. A step-by-step shadow painting demonstration is given, using readily available materials. Although presented non-technically here, the method has a technical basis, which has been published previously.