This is one for geeks probably in terms of thinking about colour. It's a chronological journey in terms of his thinking about colour. Because it's 30 minutes, to get a feel for it, you might want to pick it up at 5:10 where he talks about the luminousity in the room; or 8:25 with the boy on the roof. The children with the crocodile also fascinating.
I do love his paintings - if you google his name and paintings you'll get a feel for his work.
Comments
I'm so glad you posted a link to the video, @Abstraction.
I agree with Rob. I've seen it argued that it wasn't until the invention (and use) of lenses that paintings could show tremendous detail in all areas. Great old masters also commonly used cartoons to transfer images, grid systems and other such techniques.
Image editing on computer and the ability to zoom in on a digital photo is an invaluable tool.
When you learn about artists like Constable and Rembrandt you find out that they often did compositional sketches and then smaller (but still large) full colour paintings ahead of their final piece. This must have taken many hours to do. Well, when I use the computer to alter an image for use as a source photo it also takes many hours, trying different things, improving lighting, colours, compositional changes, etc.. It's just a modern way of doing the same kind of process