The Design Principle of proportion and scale are closely linked to two other principles, boundaries and perspective, and to the Design Elements shape and size.
Proportion describes the relationship between the dimensions of different shapes and forms you’ll be painting and the overall dimensions of your composition. Scale refers to an artwork’s size and how parts of a composition relate to each other. Proportion creates an illusion in the viewer’s eye about how far an object is to other forms. By holding the scale of one shape or form as a reference point and comparing it with the scale of some other shape or form in the painting, the illusion is generated.
A few lessons can be gleaned from my 25 years of painting technical illustrations for an engineering company and can help us make better choices and decisions when it comes designing the best compositions for our paintings, helping them to live and breathe.
- Sketch a rough draft of the major subjects (Shapes) within your scene. Ask: is there not enough air around them to be able to breathe? Or maybe there’s too much air? Not enough air and your subject seems to suffocate; too much air and your subject gets lost, seems insignificant and boring. Starting in this abstract shape-making mode will give you a good idea if the sizes and shapes are working correctly within the proportions of your canvas. If not, zoom out or in, depending on the area you must work with. A scene captured too tightly has a feeling of “in your face,” giving the viewer almost a claustrophobic uncomfortable feeling. This is where perspectives are typically very exaggerated and drastic. Whereas a wide view starts to reduce the sizes of your shapes and make things look distant and far away.
2. Choose a composition type and work backwards into the type that fits the scene. This is where having a good knowledge base of composition types comes in handy. There are roughly 17+-. (see graphic below.) It will serve you well to have these memorized.
3. Once you’ve picked the best composition type for your scene, sketch in the outside edges of your important objects, both left and right sides. This is your first important measurement, every other mark you make is based on the relationship to this distance. In the field, use your brush, finger, or ruler to mark off different sizes of the shapes. Also reference angles and slopes of your objects to the angles and slopes on the canvas. Do they match? Once you add several more lines, these lines now become reference markers of the scene you are drawing. The best example that can be used is in figure drawing. In figure drawing, the two most important marks you make are the top of the head and the location of the feet. Once you have these marks properly placed on the paper. everything else falls into place. Remember, the art of good design, and for good life itself, is all about the relationships.
Composition types from Edgar Paynes’s book on Compositions for Outdoor Painting.
The thing that makes all art amazing is every artist brings a different style and will see different stories all within the same scene. These choices on compositions result in many different approaches to art. All of us want our art to be more engaging and connected.