Alexander Hall, the Painting Dept. and Studios at SCAD

Week 2 of my residency at Savannah College of Art & Design and I am still alive.  I am carrying 2 studio courses this first quarter and though a quarter is 10 weeks, I am doing a compressed one in 5. The M.A. in Painting program that I am doing is through the school's e-learning program so it is a limited residency program and I am here for 5 weeks to complete this first quarter's work on campus.

I am enrolled in Graduate Drawing and Formal Aspects of Painting.  I am doing alot of work both physcial and mental in the efforts required and its a big load but also extremely fulfilling.  We had our first crit in Drawing yesterday and I survived all right.  I am coming up with really surprising concepts in terms of what constitutes a "drawing" and it leads to the use of some really varied and unexpected media and technical problems to be solved.

In painting I am trying to work in oils instead of the pastels that I have specialized in for the past 7 years.  I am learning alot of extremely in-depth color theory and employing it in my landscape paintings in an attempt to bring light into them in a new way.  My professor  actually has a background in science which combines in an extremely interesting way with his sensitive painting style and the searching, spiritual meanings in his own work.  So far in painting class I have been in the wood shop and learned to use a mitre saw and other power tools to construct my own cradled panels to paint on (one is 3 foot square) and watched a demonstration in his life painting class that included the disection of a cow's eyeball to more fully illustrate the structure of the human eye and how light actually falls across it . Then he decided I should dissect one for my painting class so I could teach them!  Yes, I did it.  Except for an aversion to bugs, I don't get squeamish about such things and always love the natural sciences myself.

I'll report more as soon as I can and show a bit of the city and my beautiful house in the historic district on Greene Square.  Meanwhile, the July Artscape in Hyannis is tomorrow night, 7/3 from 5-8 and Inner Pearl Studio is having another fabulous Open Studio, hosted by Deb while I am away

    My studio, D-3 at Alexander Hall

There are other ways that a two-dimensional image can have a three-dimensional look. But of the ones that I place in my booth, this particular piece receives the most remarks.

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Let's start by taking a trip down memory lane. At one point in time we all had an elementary art class with a brief exposure to primary, secondary and tertiary colors, but for those of us who don't remember what that means I'll explain. The primary colors are red, yellow and blue, although depending on the industry those colors vary slightly. Secondary colors consist of mixing two primary colors together to create a new color (i.e yellow + blue = green), and tertiary colors are created by mixing one primary color with a secondary color. It is within these three color groups that designers base their understanding of color and their best use in each industry.

At this point however, you may be thinking, 'How do I choose the right colors?' Well, this is where an experienced graphic designer can step in and point you in the right direction. Experienced designers know that what works in one industry may not work in another, and by applying a few basic principals they can propel your business in the right direction.

Let's say your business is an ice cream shop and your favorite colors are brown and black. Brown evokes a sense of strength and reliability, both of which are good business traits, but brown also can convey a sense of isolation and sadness, neither of which are good for a business, especially an ice cream shop (Sensation and Perception - The Color Brown)! The same goes for the color black. It's widely recognized for stability, but also for mourning. Not many people would associate those colors with an ice cream shop, but the point is that more often than not, people have a hard time seeing past their own personal preferences in color, which can send the wrong message to their customers. Instead, a designer is able to choose the correct colors based on the particular market to create focus, clarity and confidence in your brand and your business.

When you are ready to make an IMPACT…Give us a call. 330.655.5522 or visit us at www.igpr.com

This is a clever web installation concept, color chart:

http://www.moma.org/exhibitions/2008/colorchart/flashsite/cc_shell.swf

Jim Lambie's ZOBOP! installation caught my eye from the still shots.   Here's the video.  Seems like Jim doesn't do a bit of the work and can't be credited for how the final idea is going to come out since he only provided the idea and let's an army of 30 worker bees cut the vinyl and lay out the strips resulting in an end product that can be anything like he imagined.

Jrips Found >> YouTube - Color Chart: Footage from the installation of ZOBOP! at MoMA

 I recall hearing someone or other tell me that you need a certain amount of light or certain kind of light to be able to paint. Certainly you should not paint in light so dim that you cannot see the colors. Yet that is exactly what I did with this duck. I painted it (from a photo -- another no-no) in light dim enough that I only knew my colors from the lables on the tubes.

So what is TRUMATCH? It is 4-color process based on hue, saturation and brightness turned into a 3-dimensional space. Sure all color is based off of these three attributes, but TRUMATCH makes a usable and reproducible swatch system out of it. All colors are reproducible to 1% of the target color tint. This makes press-check all that much less problematic and your pieces all that much more color accurate. This is unlike Pantone's Solid-to-Process which is not always close to the Pantone original.

TRUMATCH has given me more accuracy in the past few months than I ever thought I would have with color. It is not an answer to custom colors that Pantone can handle, but it is a great tool to start using in your color arsenal. Give it a try. Swatch books are $85 ($US) for Coated or Uncoated, and will provide you some color freedom in return!

For more information visit www.trumatch.com.

However, the song "If Not Now When" is available to stream at Color Theory's iLike page.

It all starts out with white.

Around our property, Springtime begins in late Winter with the blooms of diminuitive white Snowdrops.

Several Hellebores follow with their large white and dusty pink blossoms. With their early Spring gifts of color, they are the Spring Sentinels for me here, announcing that the full season is not far away and the brilliant display of color is soon to follow. Color-play begins with the species Crocus and small Iris bulbs, promising brighter and louder color with time.

And as promised, in April, the color explosion begins and can be found everywhere. Not a quiet riot, these colors....

The bright red bed of the species Primrose I grow only along the stone edged of a shaded garden shows me just how loud a color can be.

And then there are the intriguing blossoms of an Iris....

In several other gardens, I grow those intense deep purple colors, too. This dwarf Iris 'Cherry Pop' is a color study unto itself, with the variegation that bleeds and blends from red-violet to blue purple and into ultraviolet.

Clumps of 'Cherry Pop' grown with other irises, like the saffron yellow iris blooming along the sides of my greenhouse, are colors that beckon me to look closer to hear what they are showing. Not a quiet riot, these colors.

Such color harmony of yellow and purple reminds me of basic color theory, proving to the eye that yellow effectively harmonizes with purples. They are, after all, color opposites, but serve each other well working in color complements with one another.

From my back porch, a festival of purples has blended together into a color symphony. What I see, I almost hear: the fuschia-red tones from all of the Red Buds that grow around the woods edge have harmonized with my 20-year old Persian Lilacs, and the blending of the colors once again proves how color creates the relationship. This group is of similar colors, they are neighbors in color theory -- so effective, so pleasing.

This is no quiet riot, yet these are the color sounds I have grown to know and appreciate. The plants that provide these color offerings are like old friends to me, coming to visit with their yearly gifts to teach me more about color harmony.

These gardens I tend are now a color burst of Springtime joy and with each Spring comes the beginning of a new cycle of remembrance of last year. The same colors burst, the same intensities, the same harmonizing effects. Not a quiet riot, these colors...

The proposition to systematize understanding of color combinations in art started with Leone Battista Alberti, who sees himself as the first theoretician of painting and writes his treatise with a claim to its usefulness and even necessity for the education of artists. Alberti not only pens his thoughts on the artistic process, but implies that the matter can be understood in a theoretical, discursive manner. His treatise On Painting opens this particular area of study in intellectual history with two essential assumptions: that a purposeful, methodic arrangement of color on the canvas will result in a certain visual effect (in Alberti’s case – the effect is figurative) and, secondly, that color may be utilized as a means of symbolically encoding the artwork. This ‘communication device’ of encoding color (by artist) and decoding color (by art receiver) is but one instance of the many implicit languages spoken by visual art, while the existence of any such language itself presupposes theoretical education on the part of both artists and audience. Exactly what this education consists of and how it is done in the case of color is the fabric of the research I am hereby proposing.
Associating color with feeling stands at the root of art education, color theory being among the very first things children are taught in art class. The color wheel shows the differences between ‘warm’ and ‘cold’ colors, explains how to combine two colors to obtain a third, as well as the use of black and white to lighten or darken. Apart from technique, children are also taught issues relating to color symbolism – for instance, red for passion, blue for the infinite ocean or green for calm and nature. Many are in the habit of gulfing up these lessons and to consequently value the craftiness of artworks (color-wise) according to these judgments - thinking, for instance, a figurative painting in which the lake is red to be inappropriate, or, on the contrary depicting people with blue skin in an expressionist painting to be inspired. In other words, I believe that most color-feeling associations have become set formulas – to the point of objectiveness, a fact contradictory to itself, especially if we admit that the entire purpose of learning how to associate color with feeling is to trigger a subjective reaction to art. Therefore, I dare ask whether color theory has gone completely astray from its designated intention.
Another derivative question relates to the manner in which color perception has fallen victim to standardization i.e. who set the standard and why. After consulting intellectual sources, I have learned that color theory relates to three disciplines: optical physics as understood by British empiricist Isaac Newton in terms of the properties of light; also dealing with the objective side of the matter is chromatics, an area of study dealing with human sensitivity in the retina and our ability to see the spectrum of color; finally, the metaphysical approach (Goethe, Itten and Kandinsky) has generated theories relating to our subjective perception of color and are most likely the ones to be held accountable for our contemporary understanding of the issue at hand.
The opposition between empiricism and metaphysics is readily obvious, but I find it worthy of mention that Goethe dedicated the entire second part of his Zur Farbenlehre to disproving Newton. The German’s argument against experimentalism is the precise opposite method of analysis: ‘experientialism’ (descriptive, based on subjective perception). I am not in a position to agree or disagree with the two methods, it goes without saying, but studying them would position me to bring their different consequences and influences to bear on the Bauhaus experiment in the early twentieth century. The Bauhaus theoreticians devised color theories that would combine or conflate objectivity and subjectivity.
Itself a school and movement dedicated to bringing arts and crafts together under the same roof, the Bauhaus was the ideal environment for artists to teach applied color theory. Here, painter Johannes Itten taught the core course about the correlation between color and geometrical shapes. Author of The Art of Color, Itten translated the proverbial ‘color wheel’ into a color ‘sphere’ of twelve. A poetic spirit, as well as something of a mystic, abstract painter and Bauhaus professor Wassily Kandinsky also found himself in the position to explain to his students why he painted as he did. This end in mind and studying at length Goethe's Farbenlehre, the artist began to write complex descriptions of his inner associations, as well as the perception of color and form placement upon the canvas.
After seeing such fierce intellectual preoccupation to understand human reaction to color, the daringly blunt content of a random online art class cannot but sadden me: they prescribe only five color schemes by mixing ‘primary’ and ‘secondary’ colors, then reassure us that “Color harmony is assured if you choose a color scheme and stay with it” . A flexible and subjective theory that never has been causal or argumentative still stands at the core of arbitrary – yet fixated rules about how and when to resource to color and form. The situation touches upon the ridiculous, especially because many decades spent in the spirit of art’s liberation from traditional aesthetics, decades of abstraction and conceptual art, separate us from the notion of natural constraints in art. Such an aesthetic revolution demands in and of itself that the artist be free to use whichever color he/she sees fit, in accordance with individual sentiment and sense – that being the ultimate lesson of color metaphysics. In light of this, the question essential to my research is about just how much theory there could actually be in color theory.
Despite all this, for the benefit of the endeavor to devise a color theory in our world, I propose the following methodology. Borrowing from research methods in social sciences, I would enjoy to complement the relevant literature part of my project with a few interviews given by willing ECLA students. Such interviews would be based at first upon a series of questions about the subjects’ experience with the theory of color i.e. whether they have ever taken art classes, learned about the color wheel and such or have heard of basic feeling – color associations. The ones with the least exposure to color theory are expected to make unbiased associations, while the ones more experienced in the field – the contrary. By showing them different colors/color combinations and writing down their ‘stream of consciousness’ type of reaction, I would obtain a first set of conclusions, which could also be compared to Goethe, Itten and Kandisnsky, as well as to art class handbooks. I would then repeat this process (same colors) in a different environment (such as sunny day vs. cloudy) and observe if and how reactions change.
My intention would not be to stumble upon a majority of any given reaction, although I do not exclude the possibility. Instead, I hope to discover how color perception varies among individuals and also varies in the same individual, taken at different times. The result I expect to obtain is a list of variables, which, whenever altered generate a different reaction to color e.g. education in art theory, gender, weather conditions, overall state of mind etc. Although I do not see this last part of my research as essential, it might prove to be interesting and relevant to answering whether color theory could ever be postulated in an objective manner i.e. devoid of the kind of confusion implicit in hundreds if not thousands of variables; and if not – what should we do with the rich color theory we inherited from intellectual history?

Following the popularity of our “print techniques” article and “Pantone swatch download” we have decided to do some more on simple tools that can help fashion designers and graphic designers in their quest for the perfect design for print. If you already know it all then skip this article.

Typical designers' paint or pigment:

primary colours are blue, red, and yellow. Cannot be mixed to create them.

The corresponding secondary colours are green, orange & violet. Mixed from two primaries

The tertiary colours are red–orange, red–violet, yellow–orange, yellow–green, blue–violet and blue–green. Can be produced my mixing primary and secondary hues.

Next article is on colour schemes. A colour wheel based on RGB (red, green, blue) or RGV (red, green, violet) additive primaries has cyan, magenta, and yellow secondary’s (cyan was previously known as cyan blue). Alternatively, the same arrangement of colours around a circle can be described as based on cyan, magenta, and yellow subtractive primaries, with red, green, and blue (or violet) being secondary’s. To be continued.........

Useful links:

Online dynamic colour wheel

Download colour wheels:

Flash MX format

Corel Draw 7 format

EMF format

Fireworks PNG file

Photoshop PSD RGB & CMYK

worqx (colour theory and article source)

Tiger Color, color Impact ( great software for colour management and article source)

www.october.co.uk
tshirt printing, screen printing, embroidery

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However, there are a few slight twists so it is not as if I am just remaking Ikaruga. Spectrum is best described as a Interstellar Color Theory Shooter. So instead of black/white you'll be presented with a spectrum of colors. So I suppose you can claim Spectrum will be an educational game because as the player begins to progress through the game they will hopefully learn the primary and secondary colors as well as complementary colors.

In case you do not know the very basic fundamentals of color theory I'll explain them briefly.

Primary Colors = Red, Yellow, Blue [Note - Mixing any two Primary Colors will produce a Secondary Color]

Secondary Colors = Green, Orange, Violet(Purple)

Complementary Colors = Colors that are opposite to each other on the color wheel. [Note - Mixing Complementary Colors will produce a brown)

Yellow <-> Violet(Purple)

Red <-> Green

Blue <-> Orange

So you may be asking yourself what my target audience is. Well guess what, I don't have one. I suppose some art teachers that are desperate for new ways of teaching the basics of color theory could use this game as a hopefully efficient and more exciting way to teach students. That would be cool but maybe it could also appeal to anyone that wants to play a scrolling shooter.  I really just want to experiment with this project which is why I am kind of against the target audience idea.  For the class requirements I suppose that I will use the target audience I described above.

Speaking of scrolling I don't want this to be purely a vertical or horizontal scrolling shooter. I still want to keep it top down but I think that it gets boring going in one direction or even just going in one pattern for that matter. I'd like to mix up the way the levels are designed to keep things more interesting. I am unsure if this will work but I'm willing to experiment with it and give it a shot.

The graphics will be made using Maya and Photoshop. I know, I know I said it was flash and flash doesn't exactly have 3-D capabilities but you can always render in Maya and then bring those renders to Photoshop to produce the sprite sheets. It probably would be faster to just make everything in Illustrator and Flash but I really don't want that look. I enjoy using Maya and I'm actually more efficient in it anyway so I think this could actually be fun.

Speaking of flash and its lack of strong 3-D capabilities I THINK I have a simple way of faking 3-D. I'd like to throw in a pseudo 3-D level inspired by Star Fox for the N64. I am thinking about just rendering a fly through of a scene in Maya and then trying to make a level of the game by setting up invisible collision shapes and adding enemies that kind of look like they are in perspective(as close as possible). Don't think it will work? You may be right but again I want to experiment and if it doesn't work then it will not make it into the final version of the game.

I'm probably biting off more than I can chew by myself as I want to get this game in a testable state in a few weeks time. Perhaps if I can motivate a few other game designers here to jump on the project with me I would increase my chances of getting something semi-playable. With everyone having their own projects to work on I don't think I'll be able to accomplish this. We shall see

Painting blocks to use in light and color-study still-life as explained in this previous post. (Newly gessoed panels drying in little rack behind the blocks).

After jumping head first (or was it feet first?) into oil painting, and then flailing about, trying to find my way, I realized it was time to go back to basics. Just as with writing or speaking, a basic vocabulary is essential to expressing oneself.

But I was trying speak "oils" using the vocabulary of color I'd learned with watercolor, assuming that Red is Red, whether it's watercolor or oils. Unfortunately, I'm finding that's like assuming if you can speak English you can speak French since they use the same alphabet.

Oil painting tests of different brands of color to choose my basic palette
(Click Images To Enlarge)

When I first started painting with watercolor, I made dozens of color charts, testing the various pigments to learn about their natures, alone and mixed with other colors. In watercolor this is really essential since there are so many characteristics that affect the flow of the paint: whether it charges into neighboring paint or resists it; whether it's opaque or transparent; sedimentary (leaving little spots of sediment), staining or lifts easily, how it mixes with other colors and more.

I hadn't done this with oil painting. But watching Camille Przedowek demonstrate a couple of weeks ago, I was struck by her huge "vocabulary" of color. She was quickly mixing up and painting with colors I couldn't even name! I realized my oil painting color vocabulary is about that of a 4-year old from a foreign country.

(CLICK "Continue Reading" to read and see the rest...)

Camille recommended making color charts, using the colors from my palette, mixing each of them with each other (more explanation at the end below). But before I could do that I needed to narrow the selection of colors and brands on my standard palette to speed up charting and learning the mixing qualities of the colors.

Camille suggested a list of Winsor & Newton colors. I'd been using mostly Gamblin paints. To decide which colors to keep on my palette I made some charts to compare the different colors and brands. I was surprised at the extent of some of the differences.

For one thing, the actual pigments used by different paint companies for the identically-named colors are often different. I know from my watercolor experience that pigments matter so I always look at which pigments paints are made from. Pigments are specified on the tubes with both their chemical names and their pigment index numbers (e.g. "Quinacdridone Violet"= PV 19 (Pigment Violet 19).

Alizarin Crimson & Burnt Sienna tests

Click on the color charts above and you'll see a good example of these differences. The two colors at the top left of the first chart are both called Permanent Alizarin, substitutes for true Alizarin Crimson which is not a permanent color and is rarely used anymore. I added white in increasing amounts going down each column.

The square on the left is Winsor & Newton's Permanent Alizarin Crimson, made from Anthroquinine, whose chemical name is Pigment Red 177 (or PR 177). You can see how bright and vibrant a color it is. On its right is Gamblin's version, Alizarin Permanent, made from Quinacridone Red B, Perylene Red, and Ultramarine Blue (Pigment Violet 19, Pigment Red 149, Pigment Blue 29).

Gamblin was trying make a color as much like the original Alizarin as possible, but with all those different pigments it seems much duller when blended with white or with Viridian, as in the next chart on the right above. On that chart I mixed Viridian equally with those two Alizarins and then added white to those mixtures.

The same seems to be true of the Burnt Siennas by Winsor & Newton and Gamblin in the middle of the top left chart. Winsor Newton uses Synthetic Iron Oxide, PR 101. It's bright and transparent. Gamblin uses Calcined Natural Iron Oxide, Pigment Brown 7) which is semi-transparent and a much duller color.

On the charts below I compared Yellow Ochres and other earth colors. I compared similar blues (many with misleading names, such as Manganese Blue which is actually Phthalocyanine blue mixed with white since Manganese Blue paint is no longer made (due to the high toxicity involved in the manufacturing process.) Except for the the more expensive, single pigment Cerulean, all of the blues in the chart are actually made from Phthalo blue dolled up to look like Cerulean or the non-existent Manganese.

The greens above are all manufactured from a combination of yellow and blue pigments except for Viridian which is a single pigment, low intensity, transparent green.

I've narrowed down my pigment choices, switching to some of the Winsor Newton colors from Gamblin and now I'm starting to working on the actual color combining charts. I've already had some really exciting "Aha!" moments seeing the surprising things that some colors do when mixed together.

I'm hoping that once I'm more fluent in the color language of oils I can get back to expressing myself in actual paintings without so much stuttering and stumbling and blurting of wrong "words."

This is quoted from the notes I make immediately upon waking, so coherency is not their strong point.  Brief analysis: Practicing lots of piano = dreams about practicing piano.  Not sure about the cake, but I think reading Steven Pinker's How the Mind Works before bed is probably how the thing about marriage with ulterior motives got in there.  Good book.

Anyway, after making these notes, I lay back down and tried to go back to sleep.  But I couldn't.  It was exactly the kind of insomnia I am quite accustomed to-- mostly due to an annoyingly hyperactive mind when I'm hoping for anything but-- except usually it occurs in the evening, not the morning.

I checked the time: 6:38 AM.  What the hell, I thought, I'm getting up.

And get up I did.

And I spent those extra 40 minutes eating a leisurely breakfast and practicing piano.  So nice.

Other nice things happened today, such as: excessive sunshine and "crisp" weather, Mary's hilarious story about a German kid who kept misusing the word "fucking" despite her guidance (e.g. "That concert was so fucking!"), and a totally irrelevant conversation about this article in US History.  Somehow we were talking about color theory instead of pre-WWII international policies... and when Mr. J looked our way, Sean was hurriedly said, "So, the Red Scare!" and it was quite amusing.  And futile.

Entries about my school day always tend to become laundry lists of things that happened to me and that only people who were there would really understand.  Sigh.  I apologize for boring you and will now return to doing history homework.

(Oh!  Remind me to tell you about study guides though!  Don't worry if you don't know what I'm talking about, just say to me, "Hey, April, tell us about the study guides!" and I'll be like "Oh yeah, the APUSH study guides have gotten really annoying lately because you see...")

Vẫn chỉ là 3 màu ( với hệ màu RGB) hoặc 4 màu (với hệ màu CMYK), nhưng với mỗi designer, màu sắc là một lợi thế lớn và không thể thiếu. Màu sắc là công cụ, phương tiện, là ngôn ngữ để thể hiện ý tưởng trong một bố cục. Trong bài viết này tôi sẽ giới thiệu tới các bạn một vài đặc tính cơ bản về màu sắc trong thiết kế, in ấn.

Màu nóng.

Là sự tương quan các mảng màu có tính gợi nóng như vàng, đỏ, hồng, nâu...Màu nóng tự mang trong nó sự lôi cuốn và gây chú ý, có tính phản chiếu cao. Vì vậy, với những nội dung muốn gây sự chú ý, các gam màu nóng luôn là sự ưu tiên hàng đầu. Nó có tác động mạnh mẽ đến không gian trong bố cục chung.

Màu lạnh.

Các màu mang tính gợi lạnh : Xanh lam, xanh tím, xanh lục... Nó cho bức hình cảm giác tươi tắn, toả sáng, gợi cảm giác mát mẻ, nhẹ nhàng. Điều này thể hiện rõ nhất khi bạn ngắm nhìn một cánh đồng xanh ngát hoặc một bãi biển yên bình.

Màu lạnh có tính đối lập với màu nóng.

Màu tương phản.

Được tách riêng thành một mục riêng bởi nó là sự đối lập của màu nóng và màu lạnh. Tương phản với các hệ thống các màu gốc: Xanh = C, Vàng = Y, Đỏ = M, nhờ có màu tương phản mà bức hình đạt được sự rực rỡ.

Màu tương phản thường là những màu gốc hoặc có tính gốc cao. Bản thân các màu này có độ mạnh thị giác cao, nên khi đặt cạnh nhau trong một bố cục, các màu sẽ tạo nên thị cảm mạnh. Với những màu nóng và lạnh đứng cạnh nhau, sự tương phản sẽ dịu hơn nếu được thay đổi độ sáng tối.

Màu tương đồng.

Với những màu cùng Gam nóng hoặc lạnh có một sự tương quan nhất định, chúng được gọi là màu cùng tone, hoặc màu tương đồng. Trong thực tế, màu tương đồng vẫn có thể chứa một lượng màu tương phản hoặc ngược lại, vấn đề là phải xem xét lượng màu trên một diện tích và vai trò của nó đến quan hệ hoà sắc. Hoà sắc của những màu sô sắc sẽ cho ta cảm giác thuần khiết, tinh tế.

Màu vô sắc.

Là những màu mà khi ta hoà trộn chúng với nhau không tạo nên được màu mới. ví dụ đen, trắng và các thang độ xám khi được hoà trộn.

Màu bổ túc.

Khoa học chứng minh rằng khi mắt người nhìn lâu hoặc bị kích thích mạnh bởi mộ màu nào đó thì sẽ có xu hướng tự điều chỉnh sự cảm nhận màu sắc để cân bằng thị lực. Sự điều chỉnh này tạo nên vòng màu bổ túc, và trong vòng màu cơ bản thì các cặp màu bổ túc nằm đối xứng nhau 180 độ.

Đỏ ------>> Lục

Vàng ---->> Cam

Lam ----->> Tím

Trong đó Đỏ và Lục là hai màu tương phản nhau nhất. Vàng và Tím tôn nhau và làm nhau nổi bật hơn. Cam và Lam lại cho cảm giác dịu nhẹ, tươi mát.

Màu sắc độ.

Đây là thuật ngữ để chỉ độ đậm nhạt của từng loại màu. Sự thay đổi này phụ thuộc vào việc ta cộng thêm màu đen hay màu trắng cho màu gốc để tạo nên các dải màu. Màu trắng sẽ cho ta màu sáng hơn còn màu đen thì ngược lại.

Trong 1 dải màu thường có 24 thang độ của một màu sáng, tối. ( trong một số máy hiện nay là 32).

Màu sắc điệu.

Là khái niệm chỉ sự biến thiên của màu sắc. Sự kết hợp giữa các màu hữu sắc sẽ cho ta thấy điều này. Bạn có thể dễ dàng hiểu được thế nào là một bức hình “ ngả vàng”, tone xanh hay thiên đỏ... đó chính là hiệu quả của sự kết hợp các màu. Màu đen, trắng và xám không có sắc điệu mà chỉ có sắc độ mà thôi.

Màu tác động một các mạnh mẽ, phức tạp và tinh vi và tâm lý, gây ra cảm xúc, gây sự liên tưởng, xây dựng nên tình cảm của con người. Tâm lý màu và đặc tính màu tuỳ thuộc vào năng lực, trạng thái tâm lý của người sử dụng. Đối với mỗi người màu sắc có thể đem lại các hiệu quả khác nhau, vì thế trong thiết kế, nắm chắc đặc tính của màu sắc nghĩa là bạn đã thành công một nửa rồi!

I've still yet to see how this actually ties in with the retailer's collection or clothes-- as there really isn't a direct correlation between the two. Still-- it's a clever way of trying to attempt an heretofore almost impossible to answer question.

Dntel's "Turning Red"

Marie Digby's "Paint Me in Your Sunshine"

Swizz Beatz' "Candy Green"

The Blakes' "Magic"

The Raveonettes' "Black/White"

Which begs the question, If you had to wear only one color, and one color only which would you choose?

I'm going to be boring and say black. As I have a lot of it-- and that's what I predominantly chose when given the choice between black and another color. Runner ups are gray and white, as they make up the rest of my wardrobe-- though for some reason more people remember me in gray than white. Weird.

Other logical reasons for choosing black:

• It matches everything.
• Stains don't show as easily.
• It's fool-proof.

You can read "One is the Loveliest Color" in its entirety here.

27 February 2008

You told me your stomach was a roller coaster.
I see myself distorted in your breasts
like a pair of fun house mirrors.
Your torso is a carnival.
My fingertips are children running screaming
across the fairgrounds towards the next ride.
I heard there's a new ride called Twinfinity
where we roll down a hill, embraced,
and at the bottom, the sky falls out of our eyes.
Stars twist around us, forcing us to collide
in a kiss that lasts forever.

<end>

Sorry I've been gone a few days (yes, I'm apologizing to pretty much myself).
There are times I feel ridiculous addressing multitudes of imaginary readers,
but I don't think it's an unhealthy ide, so I'll stick with it.

I've had the notion in my head for awhile that colors may vary from observer to observer. We'll never know if one's persons Green is our Green.
"Hey, what does your green look like? And don't say 'green,' I have no way of verifying that."

Imagine your hair growing to the floor in 5 seconds... I mean, just erupting out of your head, but steadily, like those play-doh barber shops where clay comes out of giant head pores.

The Contents of the Universe

The Universe is full of policemen
with femurs for batons
and bleached grins
for flashlights.

My head sunk slowly and steadily
into my ribcage.
Now I can't see the forest
for the smoke in my lungs.

These membranes were once
innocent and translucent
like a gaudy portrait
of the Virgin Mary
on a glass lamp base.

The Universe is full
of schmucks like me,
who dare to meddle
in the affairs of gods
and ghosts,
only to wake up
next to failure.

All along, we slept with failure.

<end>

Granny squares and other motifs are the quilting blocks of our art/craft. These babies are versitile and can be stunningly beautiful. You can make them in thread or yarn...they can be large or small. They come in all shapes and sizes. They are quick and easy to make, and can be put into a billion different kinds of projects!

Once again may I remind you that the yarn has a lot to do with it. You have to use your head when making projects. If it's a blankey how do you want it to feel? If it's a skirt do you really want it full of holes? Who knows maybe you do! Planning is always the key. Then there is color.

There are a myriad of tomes on color theory, there are several different color theories out there. I'm quite partial to a european theory that makes Green a primary color. Oh yes  indeed, that exists.

There are no universal acceptances on what makes a color beautiful or ugly. It depends on the culture in which you grew up. Look up color and their meanings some times. In western culture black signifies death, in many parts of asia, it is white that signifies death.

In western society white is worn for weddings, in some cultures it is green, or red, or blue.

Some cultures LOVE orange, some love avacado green (which I do not like, if it's like the dirty avacodo green, now a fresh un-oxidized avacado has a lovely shade of creamy green.) Some cultures love constrasting elements, and others like colors grouped in the same family group.

I'm in the the shake it up baby line of color use, but I do make analogous (same color family) pieces for my western minded clients.

Half of what goes wrong with motifs and granny squares is a) the yarn choice and b) the color combos.

I like to to do several motifs out of two or three colors, and make equal amounts of squares or motifs in a single (complimentary or matching) color.

 Away with the tired comments about granny squares! I for one and quite tired of hearing it...I find it interesting how people can be so brazenly rude about a craft when they have so little knowledge about that craft. I am often stunned by the comments made by those who's only knowledge of crochet is doing a picot edging on some project they created with sticks. I do not comment on other crafts of which my knowledge base is slim to none, I wish others were as courteous!

 This scarf was made by my daughter last year out of my scrumblinis (it has every natural fiber you can think of in it, except Quivet)...She was only 13 when she made it! Now, is that not fun! If she can do it, you can do it!