What Is Mood?
If you close your eyes and think of a sunset, what comes to mind? Immediately the warmth of the sun hits your face as the fiery, ember-like colors fill the sky. You may even feel a wonderful calmness passing over you as you enjoy the beauty of the day turning into night.Simply put, this is mood.
Mood in art is the ability to translate emotions onto the canvas using color, composition, and lighting. And whether it's intentional or not, at the core of every artwork is mood.
How Do I Change the Mood?
First, uncover the basics of color theory. Every color has a mood. And some even have the ability to evoke different emotions all at once.
So what are the most important aspects of mood?
- Composition
- Lighting
- Color
Since the colors of your painting go hand in hand with the lighting scheme, it's important to establish what time of day, light sources, and even which weather conditions affect your colors. Once that's all set, then you can experiment with different swatches.
The Sketch
To illustrate the power of different moods, I'll take this simple beach scene and paint it three ways: at midday, at sunset, and at night.Create a New Document at 850 x 700 pixels and 150 dpi. Using the Ellipse Tool (U), I created a quick circle with a 1 pt Stroke and set a New Layer as a Clipping Mask to the circle. Here I drew the sand, crab, and water details using a Hard Round Brush.
Now that we have a sketch all set, let's move on to the paintings.
1. How to Paint a Sunny Midday Scene
Step 1
To make things easier, this first painting will serve as the base to the others. The simple lighting scheme will allow me to transition easily into sunset and night, as long as I use Adjustment Layers wisely. Because it'll be our base, it's important that you paint on multiple layers that you can easily switch out.Remove the temporary Stroke from your circle, and Right-click to Rasterize Layer. Use the Magic Wand Tool (W) to select it. Right-click and select Inverse Selection. Create a New Group, and with the selection still active, create a Layer Mask for the group.
Step 2
Create a New Layer for each section of the painting, making sure that all your major details are separated for better organization. Name the layers after the detail they represent and use a Hard Round Brush to paint the base colors of each section. Blend the sketch layer by setting it to Soft Light and use pale bright hues as the initial colors so that it'll be easy to add light and shadow later.
Step 3
For each detail, set New Layers as Clipping Masks to that section. This will help keep the painting in only that area. Set the first round of layers to Multiply and begin adding shadow to your scene. Since it's a bright sunny day, the lighting will be from overhead, with no sun in sight just yet.
Step 4
Continue developing the lighting scheme. Add New Layers set to Overlay to add light onto the sand, water, leaves, and sky.
Step 5
Continue painting your details on layers clipped to each section. Switch over to a Hard Round Brush at 100% Hardness to define the edges so that the painting doesn't look as blurry.
Step 6
Finish defining your painting. Paint more bright light into the sky to show that the sun might be hiding behind the clouds. Add a New Adjustment Layer of Color Lookup with the following settings to make the colors more crisp and warm.
2. How to Paint a Sunrise/Sunset
Step 1
Let's move onto the sunset painting. Just like I mentioned earlier, we'll be using our first painting to help transition into different moods and times of the day. So since I'll need to change the lighting scheme dramatically, Delete a few layers from the previous painting and start around the beginning area where most of the major highlights are now gone.
Step 2
Start incorporating colors from the sunset. Set New Layers as Clipping Masks to the sky and use the Gradient Tool (G) to incorporate Linear Gradients of orange and purple into the sky. It helps to keep layers like the clouds still around because you can simply Unhide them to add to the painting.
Step 3
To dramatically change the color and lighting and make the look more cohesive, we'll need to experiment with Adjustment Layers. At the top of all your layers add a New Adjustment Layer for Color Lookup with the following settings. Then select the Layer Mask and softly paint black to remove some of the warmth from the sky and sand.
Step 4
After all that adjusting, you'll need to get back to painting to balance everything out. Set a New Layer to Overlay to add more warmth to the sky and water, and paint a bright sun as it sets in the distance. Keep the colors orange and white for the best intensity.
Step 5
Begin to paint highlights onto the water. This time the mood is much calmer than the bright sunny day we painted earlier. Make the water appear still, with a focus on reflecting the sun along the subtle ripples.
Step 6
Just like before, use a Hard Round Brush at 100% Hardness to clean up the details of your painting. Currently the crab is pretty blurry looking, so make sure you outline it with some crisp highlights.
3. How to Paint a Night Scene
Step 1
Last but not least, it's time to tackle the night scene! Just like before, we can start this painting using the sunny beach day as our base. This time we'll keep some of the bottom parts of the painting while mostly deleting the layers dedicated to the sky.
Step 2
Merge the layers for the sky together. Then create a New Layer above it and set it as a Clipping Mask to the sky. Use the Gradient Tool (G) to create a Linear Gradient of a dark blue color across the sky. This will help to create a blank canvas for our night scene.
Step 3
To remove the rest of the sunny aspects of the original painting, we'll need to use Adjustment Layers again. Start with two New Adjustment Layers dedicated to Color Lookup. These will instantly make the colors more uniform for a cool night-time scene.
Step 4
Create a New Layer and set it to Multiply. Add shadow using a Soft Round Brush along the sand, leaving an open space in the middle where the moon will be. Try to simulate a silhouette effect again while creating more drama by concentrating the shadows on the sides. You'll also notice I decided to paint land in the distance to allow the sailboat to pop against the background.
Step 5
Create a New Layer set to Overlay to paint a bright white moon against the dark sky. Paint more glow around the moon and let it spill onto the water as the light helps to illuminate the scene.
Step 6
As always, switch over to a Hard Round Brush at 100% Hardness to make each detail crisper. Add tiny dots for the stars in the sky and sparkles from the moon shining on the sand and water. Paint the reflection of the moon onto the water with tiny, squiggly ripples.
Good Luck!
You can magically transition one painting into different moods and color schemes with the help of Adjustment Layers and Blend Modes.Experimentation leads to great results, so learn to break away from your typical linear painting process and have fun with Photoshop's diverse tools and settings.
Learning how to make colorful paintings takes time, so if you have any questions about this process, feel free to leave them in the comments below.
