Mix the Color You Really Want - every time
Blue and yellow don’t make green? But we were taught that in school, and many times too!
If this is news to you, after reading this book by Michael Wilcox, you will discover why simply mixing blue and yellow usually doesn’t make the green you are looking for. This post is a book review of the second revised edition, published by School of Color Publications, 2001. www.schoolofcolor.com
Although this book/manual appears more relevant to artists working with premixed tubes of paint, the information and facts are completely transferable to fiber artists who want to mix fiber reactive dyes with confidence and repeatability.
Since the many color exercises in this manual involve using specific pre-mixed paint colors such as Cadmium Red Light, just continue along reading the theory and study the exercise results because they are printed in extremely accurate color rendition and with very useful notes. The theory that works for paints works for dyes in the same way.
Excerpt from page 9, “I realize that most creative people will resist coming to terms with the theoretical side of color mixing. By the end of the book you should be able to mix any color that your require, in any medium, quickly, accurately and without waste. Your work can only improve.“ (Wilcox)
I hope it’s from experience as a colorist that Wilcox also writes that artists, by their very nature, often avoid most things to do with science. So he spends considerable time describing with excellent graphics how understanding the nature of visible light is essential to grasping this new way of looking at color theory. You will learn a lot. Stick with it.
For fiber artists who work with fiber reactive dyes, as you are reading this theory section, I suggest, just think of dye molecules bonded to fabric when Wilcox refers to colored specks of powder held together by a clear film of glue, (prepared paint). The theory is independent of the medium.
-from the back cover, “With sales of over 400,000 copies world wide, this book has changed the way that artists and all who use color think about color mixing. It has become the standard reference book in this subject.”
So stop mixing mud. Save your precious fabrics, time, energy and money. Read this book.
See my book review on Katie Widger’s New Color Wheel Dyeing 