I started documenting my mixes with 2″ x 2″ swatches and ended up making a series of fan decks\u00a0with two primary mixes\u00a0for all the Fimo primaries.\u00a0\u00a0The\u00a0top photo shows\u00a0the Carmine, Burgundy, and Red Fimo fan decks\u00a0I made by mixing the reds to yellows and to the complementary green.\u00a0\u00a0After baking the swatches, I wrote the formula on the back, drilled holes in the corners and used a head-pin to\u00a0hinge\u00a0the swatches\u00a0into\u00a0fan decks.\u00a0 The second photo shows\u00a0the Fimo swatches that I used as the palette for the Fable Vessel series. \u00a0The third photo shows a collection of the different types of swatches I’ve used over the years to document colors mixed with white.\u00a0 The first batch is Fimo, the second is Premo, the third is Premo using the Watercolor Technique. I keep these swatches loose and stored\u00a0in wooden boxes so I can pull them out when I need color inspiration.<\/p>\n Color Templates<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/a> Before I switched to color scales, I sometimes documented mixes by inserting the colors into holes punched in templates made from gray clay.\u00a0\u00a0To get the lines and\u00a0the patterns for cutting\u00a0holes, I drew up the templates on the computer and made copies to\u00a0transfer the design to the raw clay.\u00a0 I\u00a0then cut out the holes with a circle cutter and baked the template before adding the color mixes. This technique proved to be way too labor intensive for me . . . but it might be right up your alley.<\/p>\n \u00a0Color Scales <\/strong><\/p>\n Color Scales came about when I\u00a0needed an easier way\u00a0to organize my mixes and see all the possibilities\u00a0at a glance.\u00a0 The\u00a0top photo with the round beads shows some of\u00a0the first color scales I\u00a0ever made.\u00a0\u00a0They\u00a0were made\u00a0in Fimo around 1994 and\u00a0each scale was strung on wire so that I could mix and match them\u00a0for different\u00a0primary combinations. \u00a0I ended up with over 40\u00a0 two-color scales that could be interchanged to get the palette I wanted.\u00a0 The second photo shows some of the Fimo color scales\u00a0going to white and black. The third photo shows\u00a0a few\u00a0bead strands that\u00a0I made for project palettes; the bicone bead strand\u00a0was made with Fimo, the other two are Premo. The last photo shows three bead strands that I made to\u00a0document double primaries in Premo. The\u00a0\u00a0orange scales\u00a0were\u00a0made from Cad\u00a0Yellow, Zinc Yellow, Cad Red and Fuchsia.\u00a0 For the green scales, I\u00a0used Cobalt, Ultramarine, Cad Yellow and\u00a0Zinc Yellow. The purple scales used\u00a0Cad Red, Fuchsia, Cobalt and Ultramarie.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n As you can see, I never bothered to come up with one perfect way to keep track of all the test mixing I do in the studio.\u00a0 The important thing is to do it – document it if you can – and move on to the next project!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Taking some time to make and document color mixes is the best way to learn how to mix colors instinctively.\u00a0 Playing scales on the piano trains the ear, making color mixes trains the eye. Color scales are my favorite way to record my color mixes but\u00a0I encourage you to\u00a0come up with your\u00a0own system for\u00a0keeping track […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":7045,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[22,26,27,28,29,12],"class_list":["post-1282","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-polymer-arts","tag-color-inspirations","tag-color-scales","tag-color-swatches","tag-color-templates","tag-documenting-color-mixes","tag-watercolor-technique"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maggiemaggio.com\/color\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1282","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/maggiemaggio.com\/color\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/maggiemaggio.com\/color\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maggiemaggio.com\/color\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/22"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maggiemaggio.com\/color\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1282"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/maggiemaggio.com\/color\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1282\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maggiemaggio.com\/color\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7045"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maggiemaggio.com\/color\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1282"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maggiemaggio.com\/color\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1282"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maggiemaggio.com\/color\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1282"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Colorscales1\"](\"https:\/\/maggiemaggio.com\/color\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/11\/Colorscales1.jpg\" "\\"Colorscales1\\"")
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