Senior Project - Color Studies

I did 15 color studies for far for the background, and these are the better ones. None of them are giving me the mood I'm going for, though.

Strangely, or perhaps obviously, I like some of them better when there is a character within the frame. This is a somewhat more accurate representation of the final look (though without anything being final).

What I really need to work on with these now is leading the eye using tonal value.