Color & Texture in Layers

Students in the Mixed Media Class a Joggles are coming up with some beautiful surfaces. I have a start on a few, but I'm still not quite happy with them yet. They need something more ...

I had asked Sue B, the instructor, specifically what paints she used on a particular journal she'd made. I'm trying to identify the looks and effects that appeal to me, and purchase paints and supplies accordingly. Sue's answer was basically anything goes. Whatever you have around that will deliver the effect you are going for is what you use. I guess that means I'll just have to get a variety and experiment to find what I like ...

So the world is open wide ....

I found this chart at Artist's Cellar on layering Stewart Gill Paints. Feels like some secrets are revealed here. Now I just need to figure out what paints to purchase ...

Often at the start of a new project, a sort of "color paralysis" hits me when facing a blank slate. What color combinations to use so I don't wind up with mud?

Funny--I don't get that feeling with paper and words. I remember my old college room-mate had a treat for me. One day she took me (all but blind-folded) to the paper aisle of an office supply store. There I felt very comfortable--what potential in all that blank paper, and what I could write on it! Color is a different animal entirely ...

Color Help - Color Lovers provides thousands (maybe millions?) of coordinating color pallets that members have put together. That should give me a start. But then the flat colors on the pallet don't quite excite me the way a finished piece does. Color is just one element of a finished piece. The Color Lovers pallets are missing texture and depth, "a little bit of this, and a whole lot of that." Actually, there is a section for pattern ... I'll need to explore that more. The pallets can be a tool, not the finished product.

I just need to get off my duff and work on some of these surfaces!