Colour scales

 I am working my way through the Polymer Clay Color Inspirations: Techniques and Jewelry Projects for Creating Successful Palettes book by Maggie Maggio and Lindly Haunani.

This was my first go with the colour scales exercises. I enjoyed doing them and they didn't take as long as I thought they might. I can see I will be doing some more with the other Kato package colours.

Kato blue to green and yellow to magenta colour scales

Pinched Petal Necklace from Color Inspirations

This is another exercise from Polymer Clay Color Inspirations: Techniques and Jewelry Projects for Creating Successful Palettesby Lindley Haunani and Maggie Maggio.

 I had trouble deciding on my primary colours as the Kato colour chips I made that matched colours in my collage  were fairly equally split between red and magenta and also turquoise and blue so I put this project off for quite a long time. Also I was sure I wouldn't ever wear it so nearly didn't bother doing it at all. I opted for magenta in the end and made a custom 50:50 blue:turquoise for my blue, yellow was packet yellow.


I wasn't thinking very clearly and forgot to put the black and white skinner blend through the pasta machine on a thinner setting before I rolled it up. I didn't worry about it too much as I was just doing the exercise in case I learnt something rather than to make a necklace to wear.
 I started cutting and forming the pinched petal beads. There were a lot!
I pierced the hole with a needle tool.

 I had left the cane overnight before slicing and some of the black and white skinner blend cane parts split a bit. I didn't worry about it too much as it was on the backs of the beads and I assumed you wouldn't see them. I found out that was wrong and you could see many of the backs so if you are making these make sure the backs are neat too!

 I started stringing them and couldn't work out if I was going to put them on alternately - one facing forward, one facing back or all the same way. I tried both and decided all facing forwards.

I strung them on tiger tail initially.

Didn't like the blip in sequence at the middle in the back.

The two ends of the cane both had the same colours in and they didn't flow well so I took them off and reordered them so the colour flowed throughout the necklace in one circle. At that point I decided to restring them on Beadalon Elasticity so that I wouldn't have a clasp so it could be worn any way round. The holes were too small for the thicker Elasticity I have so I had to use the thinner one (must plan ahead more!).

The finished necklace (well OK I took this before I had glued and trimmed the ends of the Elasticity).

I put it on and it felt quite nice so I left it on. I have worn it several times and am surprised to say I really like it! I thought it would be a bit 'too much' but it is very flexible it goes with most of my wardrobe!

Only problem is the weight of the beads is too much for the thin Elasticity and it has stretched. Guess I will have to restring it on the thicker stuff after I have enlarged all the holes.

Just goes to show you should try things, you might like them more than you think!

Pivot Tile from Color Inspirations and improved confidence.

I finally got round to making a pivot tile from Polymer Clay Color Inspirations. I had a real mental block on this for some reason. I didn't have any orange clay when I got to that section and then I kept on putting it off.

I quite enjoyed it and was quite surprised how much the colour changed with such small additions. I think it will be a useful tool for colour mixing so I shall make some more with the other Kato block colours.

I can see I have quite a lot of air bubbles in the clay. They are such tiny amounts of clay I did a bit of squishing through the pasta machine instead of folding and putting the fold first. I guess that's where they came from.



I spent an evening introducing some friends to polymer clay the other night and I was quite surprised by how confident I felt in guiding their colour choices. Although I haven't worked my way through the book yet I can tell it has definitely improved my confidence with colour already. Particularly for caning, where I sometimes got disappointing results due to poor colour choices. So I would highly recommend it to anyone else who either isn't sure about colour or who just doesn't think about it currently (how I used to be)

Kato Colour Chips

Now I have decided on a brand to use, Kato Clay I have started working my way through some of the exercises in Maggie Maggio and Lindly Haunani's book- Polymer Clay Color Inspirations . I am no colour expert having had no formal art training, I did a science degree and worked in scientific research for a while before retraining to teach in Primary Schools (4 to 11 year olds ). I do know the basics of colour mixing but I struggle a little with the polymer clay colours as I haven't mixed them much in the past and also I struggle combining colours in projects.

My kind neighbour took the kids out for a couple of hours and my lovely husband went to do the food shopping so I settled down (with my leg up) to make some colour chips. The recipes in the book aren't ideal for kato as they suggest using 2 different yellows and 2 different blues. These colours are available in Premo and Fimo but there is only 1 blue and 1 yellow for Kato. I played about with the quantities a bit to make some different colours.

I enjoyed fiddling around making new colours and I can see these chips will be useful in future as I can pick up the colours I want to use and then check the back for the recipe to mix.

 Tasting tiles or colour chips in Kato Polymer Clay. Blob on top is colour mixed 1:1 with white and there is a pie chart recipe on the back.

I spent the night dreaming of colours which was a new experience for me and I can't wait to try and mix some more.

My work from Polymer Clay Color Inspirations by Lindly Haunani and Maggie Maggio.

 Package Colour Testing

Made some with Premo then decided I was going to use Kato as my main clay so made some of those too. It was interesting to see how the colours changed when they were mixed with white and also how the baked colours compared. Useful knowledge so worth doing.

Value Sorting

I found this hard, to see the value of the colours. Then inspiration struck and I used my digital camera in black and white mode as my eye. Now I have got used to the idea I can see the value better myself without digital aids ;) Perhaps that turquiose is between the lighter and mid grey. I am not quite sure how to use value but I hope to work that out one day.

Seeing value through the camera

Tasting Tiles

Premo tasting tiles in green, they have the little pie chart recipe on the back. 

Found it hard to tell the yellows apart when baked so wrote on them to remind me.

I made some of these in Premo and now have to make some in Kato - post to follow soon.

New Color Inspirations Topic

I have made a new topic (see link on right) to show my work from Polymer Clay Color Inspirations by Lindly Haunani and Maggie Maggio. I am just starting out with the exercises  but will update it as I go along. I was inspired to do this after visitng Jeanette Kandray's Clay, Color, Creativity blog .http://jmkandray.com/Blog/ . I really enjoyed reading about her experiences with the exercises so here are mine.