use value - not color or detail - as the framework for your composition

Look for an opportunity to create a white path into the composition and link the whites into a single shape. If you allow the whites to separate each one could fight against the viewer's attention, and the composition could lack unity. I am not necessarily talking about the color white. I am talking about lightning the values you use, to create a viewer's path, to bring the eye to your focal point.

Once you have your white and mid tone paths, you can complete the composition framework by adding darks. The darks do not need to create a single path. The reason is that the eye seems to connect darks even if they are not literally connected.

Get The Light Right

A major consideration is the light source. The old rule of thumb used in architectural perspectivist is that the light source should come from over the left shoulder. This configuration puts one face of the building in bright light and the other in shadow, which makes it easier for the viewer to understand the structure.  

Color Meaning, Symbolism and Psychology

What does color mean, and how does it make you feel? I once heard that a color doesn't exist, unless it has a name. A rendering or illustration should tell a story. Do you want to make your viewer feel happy or sad, calm or excited, color can help you accomplish your goal of telling a story.

HOW THE COLOR GREEN AFFECTS US PHYSICALLY

• Soothes
• Relaxes mentally, as well as physically Helps alleviate depression, nervousness, and anxiety
• Offers a sense of renewal, self-control, and harmony

HOW THE COLOR BLUE EFFECTS US PHYSICALLY

• Calms and sedates Cools
• Aids intuition

HOW THE COLOR YELLOW AFFECTS US PHYSICALLY

• Stimulates mental processes
• Stimulates the nervous system
• Activates memory
• Encourages communication

HOW THE COLOR ORANGE AFFECTS US PHYSICALLY

• Stimulates activity
• Stimulates appetite
• Encourages socialization

HOW THE COLOR RED AFFECTS US PHYSICALLY

• Increases enthusiasm
• Stimulates energy and can increase the blood pressure, respiration, heartbeat, and pulse rate Encourages action and confidence
• Provides a sense of protection from fears and anxiety

HOW THE COLOR PURPLE AFFECTS US PHYSICALLY

• Uplifts
• Calms the mind and nerves
• Offers a sense of spirituality
• Encourages creativity

HOW THE COLOR PINK AFFECTS US PHYSICALLY

• Bright pinks, like the color red, stimulate energy and can increase the blood pressure, respiration, heartbeat, and pulse rate.
• They also encourage action and confidence. Pink has been used in prison holding cells to effectively reduce erratic behavior.

HOW THE COLOR BROWN AFFECTS US PHYSICALLY

• Supplies a feeling of wholesomeness stabilizes
• Provides a connection with the earth gives a sense orderliness

HOW THE COLOR GRAY AFFECTS US PHYSICALLY

• Unsettles
• Creates expectations

HOW THE COLOR BLACK AFFECTS US PHYSICALLY

• Makes one feel inconspicuous
• Provides a restful emptiness
• Is mysterious by evoking a sense of potential and possibility

HOW THE COLOR WHITE AFFECTS US PHYSICALLY

• Aids mental clarity
• Encourages us to clear clutter or obstacles Evokes purification of thoughts or actions
• Enables fresh beginnings

Squint/Spatial Illusion

To check your rendering for balance, you can squint your eyes, which helps you concentrate on shapes and lines, avoiding all the detail. Your rendering will never look complete, until you achieve balance in your composition. To show you the value of squinting, here is a squint/spatial illusion

On a close-up view, you can see on the left face, an angry man and on the right face, a woman with a neutral facial emotion. But further back, the faces change expression and even genders! if you squint, blink, or defocus, an angry man should substitute for the face of the woman, and the left angry face should not be angry anymore.

This impressive illusion created by Dr. Aude Oliva and Dr. Philippe G. Schyns, illustrates the ability of the visual system to separate information coming from different spatial frequency channels. In the right image, high Spatial Frequencies (HSF) represent a woman with a neutral facial expression, mixed with the low spatial frequency (LSF) information from the face of an angry man. On the left, the face of the angry man is represented in fine details whereas the underlying female face is made of blur only ("blobs")

Capturing a Mood

Many times the most captivating characteristics about a subject is the feeling invoked in the viewer. For example, the energy of a bustling street scene or the serenity of a peaceful meadow can be captivating. So how do you translate the mood of the scene to the screen? In general, warm colors portray a sunny, upbeat mood, whereas cool colors seem more calm or mysterious. For example, a sunlit field of bright yellow flowers seems cheerful and invigorating, where is a quiet harbor blanketed in blue-gray fog appears serene and still.

In this rendering, of an unused roof deck, I wanted to create a mood of a hot summer day. The building owner wanted to convert the roof deck into a patio space. The concept was to convert a cold space into a warm space, which I accomplished by using color.

Here, is the same rendering, only using cool colors, to create a more mysterious mood. I created a night scene, but I changed the ambient light, and kept the warmth contrasts of the artificial lights.

So, as you can see, just by the use of color I can change the mood and invoke a whole different feeling.

Detail

Detail is a imperative to any well-finished rendering. If overdone, however, detail can be a detraction. Too "busy" a rendering is bewildering, and its main purpose is smothered in a welter of minutia.

A talented artist recognizes this fundamental fact: what is left out of a rendering can be as significant as what is put-in.

Study of photography with a wide range of tonal value will help you understand how and where detail should be played down or limited. Notice its tendency to disappear in bright sunlight or dark shadow, how obvious it becomes in middle value areas, how much vegetation is massed together rather than seperation in isolated clumps. You will also learn much by examining the work of other illustrators

Cropping

An illustrator has a natural tendency to include too much in a composition. When this fact is clear, he has an equally natural reluctance to remove portions of a rendering over which has worked so diligently. Renderings are often improved significantly by some judicious "cropping" - removing areas that detract from the center of interest or interferes with the effectiveness of the composition.

None of the rendering actually needs be cut away or destroy. It may be crop differently (non-destructively) for another use, so keep the entire rendering and crop in a non-destructive way.

Whats its color

Whats its color is an image-color processing utility that will evaluate an image and give you the image's primary and complementary dominant colors of an image, how many visually unique colors are in an image, and the top ten visually unique colors in an image. Extremely useful when creating any type of designs around an image. The more colorful the image, the better the results. Results will display your image on the best suited background for that image... http://whatsitscolor.com/

Shadow

To create the most pleasing shade and shadow pattern, light intesity should be greatest on the main facade (or facade at the least angle to the picture plane). Secondary or receding walls receive less intensity and are lightly shaded.  

Cast shadows should be deep enough to strengthen and emphasize the eve line, but not so deep as to overpower the architectural design with a too-heavy effect.

How do you know when an artist is telling a story?

To decide whether a painter is visual narrative, you should ask yourself three questions:

1. Does the artwork suggest the passage of time (as opposed to being static, like a still life)?
2. Does it seem to have a beginning and an end?
3. Does it hint at something that happened outside of the picture frame?

If the answer to any of these questions is "yes," then the artist is probably telling a story.

How do you read these stories? To read a narrative painting, you don't necessarily start to the left and move toward the right the way you read a book. Instead you begin at the focal point {the place where the artist leads your eye). The focal point may be the beginning of the story - but it can also be The climax.