Tony, I am not sure about underpainting either. I was in the middle of my current one and decided right then and there that popping in a thousand dabs for leave was just taking too long, so I put in an underpainting of solid darker green. Underpaintings do work well and many many artist do use them (blocking in sold masses of color) Good luck on your painting. It's a big one!
underpainting is usually either done with the darkest value or a neutral colour or the complimentary colour, so it's a very difficult question to answer. In other words It's not possible to give a "use Sap Green" type of answer here.As for me I don't even use the underpainting technique as I believe the light goes through the paint and bounces off the white canvas, giving the painting more luminosity. So by adding an underpainting I lose that effect.
Hi Tony, nice to see you back and using water mixable oils. They work great for me, but now I'm resting from art work since coming down with bad cold. And I'm reviewing music theory, guess from whose site! It's great for visualizing piano chords, along with chording on the fretboard! You're a GREAT teacher!
I did an experiment the other day with the colors we use in the teaching studio testing the transparency of each.OPAQUE: Titanium White, Raw Umber and Yellow Ochre.TRANSPARENT: Cad Yellow, Cad Red, Cad Orange, Aliz Crimson, Viridian and Ultramarine Blue.Interesting I'm also busy testing the drying times without the use of any medium (normal single thin layer). Raw Umber, Viridian and Cad Yellow dried within 24 hours. Unbelievably Yellow Ochre and Cad Red are taking longer to dry than White
Most beautiful photos, Topdog.