Achieving aerial perspective with a limited palette.
How do you achieve aerial perspective when you paint with a limited palette, specifically when you choose all cool or warm colors for your painting? In general I understand the color theory where a far distance is cooler than a foreground. Say I pick ultramarine and raw sienna for trees. For the mid/foreground trees, no problem painting with these two colors? But what do I do for the background trees? Do I just use more ultramarine in the mix hence the blueish green for the background trees or do I introduce cool colors like winsor blue/aureolin hence expanding my limited palette? I would love to hear from members the ways you achieve the aerial perspective when you paint with the limited palette. Thanks. H.
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Hi Wilson,
Paul and Edo have both already given you great advice, and I'm just chipping in to say that as well as using a cooler colour mix for distant objects, remember to use enough water! Distant objects should more often than not be painted very transparently, unless they are the focal point. For really out of focus objects in the far distance, wet-in-wet is the technique your after, but this is easier said than done... It takes a lot of practise, because you want the right paint consistency on your brush, as well as the right kind of dampness on your paper. Edo is a champ of this technique, so I recommend checking out his videos on YT, for some great examples!