Education and Inspiration

Reading values in landscape is somewhat different from reading values in other subjects. All subjects have a light source, but the source in landscape—the illuminated dome of the sky—is part of the subject. This often leads students to misread the values between the broadest divisions in the landscape. For instance, enough contrast is often not established between the land and the sky, which is usually the biggest value contrast in the painting. This, in turn, leads to an incorrect reading of the ground plane, which is often made too light. If these basic divisions get mixed up, it becomes very difficult to maintain a convincing sense of landscape space.

Landscape values are much easier to understand if they are viewed as falling into four major divisions or zones. Robert F. Carlson in his classic Guide to Landscape Painting lays out his Theory of Angles. The theory essentially says that major landscape elements—skies, trees, hills, ground—are on different planes. The angle of the plane in relation to the sun determines how much light it receives, which in turn determines its value. For example, the flat ground, being directly under the sun, receives the most light (after the sky), while other areas, like trees and hills, which are more upright, receive less light.

These value divisions apply to ordinary daylight and most overcast days. There are exceptional situations in which divisions behave differently: snow or desert scenes, in which the ground can be lighter in value than the sky; the intense brilliance of the sun-struck side of a building, sunsets, or the sunburst that breaks through the clouds and strikes the ground after a storm. But knowing how the theory generally applies also teaches us how to adapt and make better observations in the exceptional situation.

Value divisions in the landscape. In ordinary daylight, and even in most overcast situations, landscape values can be considered to fall into four broad value divisions—light, half-light, half-dark, and dark. Although not an absolute formula (weather conditions and varying local colors may cause the divisions to deviate) they are consistent enough to serve as a reliable way to check value assignments at the start of a painting. Restricting the values to four zones also has the benefit of pushing one’s eye toward finding the basic shapes and planes.

1 - LIGHT [SKY) - The sky is almost always the lightest value zone in the landscape and accounts for what is usually the largest value contrast in the painting—between the sky and the land. This holds true even on cloudy or overcast days.

2- HALF LIGHT (HORIZONTAL PLANES) - The ground is a horizontal plane. Being directly under the sky, it receives more light than upright elements like trees and hills, but it is still darker than the sky.

3 - HALF DARK (SLANTING PLANES) - The next darkest zone is slanting planes, like hills or rooftops. They receive less light than the ground, and are therefore darker than the ground, but lighter than the more vertical elements.

4 - FULL DARK (VERTICAL PLANES) - Vertical elements, such as trees and architecture receive the least amount of light and so are usually the darkest values in the painting.