Favorite Color Mixes??? could be fun and informative

[Doug Fielder]

Just wondering about some color fomulas people like to mix and what colors they look good upon, and who has a good formula for Peach.

One color that I made that came out really nice is Vermillion and Chamois, it gave me a nice antique looking warm red, it looks really nice on a medium red background, black and sage green too.
I had also made a nice sage green once, but I forget the mix.
Some of my other favorites are Slime Green, made from various blues and yellows, such as Process Blue and Lemon Yellow.
Pro-flex blue, the name says it all.
Wellow, same here, great to start off a wellow to red airbrush fade with lemon yellow, yellow orange (a nice color on black), orange and red.
Olive green, Black and yellow.

I have a couple others written down at the shop, I hope to add some more...

Thank you.

[Mike Jackson]

Doug,
A lot of people will surely have their formulas. I'll let them post theirs.

I doubt WE ever do it, but we have discussed a ChromaHeads meeting before, with the meeting focusing on color mixing, color theory, and so forth. Your post is in line with a group project we had considered....

I thought about getting two or three dozen 18" x 24" white masonite or aluminum panels ready with a title bar and groups of three hollow rectangles screen printed on them. When the meeting started, we'd cover all of them with transferrite and let people cut and peel all the little rectangles, protecting the background. There might be three or columns of the three rectangles, with maybe 8 to 10 rows. That would set up 24 to 30 color combinations. The three rectangles would allow you to put each of the two original colors in the left two rectangles and then the mixture in the third one.

To make it a group project, I envisioned having all three dozen panels layed out on tables and benches. Then the first person would grab a 1" foam brush and start putting that color in each of the panels, sort of like a cake walk. When they were finished, they'd grab a cup with new color and a fresh brush and get in the back of the line. Then they'd apply the second color of their choice right next to their first rectangle. As you might expect, they'd then mix the two cups together and go around the tables again to fill in the third rectangle. When relatively dry, the transferrite mask could be removed, leaving a nice clean panel.

The idea would be to include everyone of every skill level and encourage the mixture of colors that might seem a bit uncommon or untested, as you are mentioning. In the end, everyone would have a sample with about 24-30 interesting color combinations. If you had enough panels and enough interest, you could repeat the process on a new panel.

Besides the samples, a lot of discussion would be going on the entire time and everyone could be involved, without fear of doing anything wrong.

I figured someone could do a seminar on color theory, color wheels, pictorial blending techniques and so forth.

Mike Jackson

[Doug Fielder]

Hey Mike,

That is a great idea! I actually have panels painted in all 40 of the 1-shot colors and started marking them out for doing the other 39 colors on each one, just to see some interesting color reactions and some color ideas I haven't thought of. That is a lot of work, but one day I will get to letter them all, and put them up all around the shop for the design-blind people.
The color mixing thing is mostly for interesting colors to use while pinstriping or lettering on unusual colored backgrounds etc.

...if I had only taken that painting class when I was in college.....

Thank you.

[Doug Fielder]

I see this has been read by 55 people, none of them have favorite color mixes!?!?!
Here are some:
Lemon Yellow and Purple = Imagination Gold, nicer than 1-Shot's own.
Magenta and Reflex = Raspberry
Chamois and Medium Green = Nice Sage Color
Ivory and Orange = Some Peach color
Ivory and Salmon Pink = Flesh tone
Chrome Yellow and Black = Sage (+ some white for tinting)
Process Blue and Emerald Green = Teal
Fire Red and Black = Rust
Fire Red and Chrome Yellow = Golden Color
Orange and white and a tiny bit of Magenta = Peach
Chrome Yellow adn Maroon = Orange

This much is dedicated to a great girl that was murdered in Burlington Tuesday night:
http://www.wcax.com/Global/story.asp?S= ... v=4QcRXIey
Good bye Laura, I am sorry we didn't get to know eachother better.

[Mike Jackson]

Doug,
One of the advantages of being an old codger packrat is being able to pull out little treasures like the one above. The color chart was printed in 1991 and again in 1994 by Lynn Carr. They were sold through SignCraft for several years, and I managed to buy one before they were discontinued.

The difference in this selector and formula guide and most others is it was made with actual sign painter's bulletin paint. Pretty cool! Many of the pages have basically standard "out of the can" colors in the middle with three tints and three shades. Some of the other pages consist of two equal parts sign colors like Primrose Yellow mixed with Reflex Blue to make the main color, with three tints and three shades made from that mix.

I am not sure why people haven't listed their favorite color mixes. We have a lot of readers and a limited number of active posters. Always have!

I probably approach the issue backwards to your question. I would more likely ask myself (or visualize) what color I need, and then pick the two or maybe three colors I think will get the results I want. Similarly, I like to pick up the color swatch selectors at our local paint suppliers. Even though they are basically paint made for latex applications, I can mix enamels to a pretty close match. My approach is probably based more on several exhaustive color classes I took in college, and maybe not so much from random color mixings.

If I understand it correctly, you are asking people to list their "happy accidents"? Like Magenta mixed with Maroon? Or Magenta mixed with Chrome Yellow? Or Orange, mixed with Maroon and a little black to make an interesting brown?

Interesting topic.
Mike

[Mike Jackson]

Doug,
I have found the readers on this board to respond to specific questions, and not quite as likely to sit down and write a lengthy reply on a general, open ended question. Being one of the web hosts here, I tend to try to respond when I can, but I don't feel obligated to answer every question. I think most of our readers are successful business men and women and resist the temptation to sit down to write out a 30 minute response.

All of us have asked questions and had few or no replies. Part of it just comes with the nature of this small cross section of people in the sign business. Letterville has several thousand members, while this one has only a couple hundred registered members. Most people here seem to be busy most of the time and none get paid to stop and answer questions. I sense a little frustration at your end, but unfortunately, I don't have a solution for you. I can't twist people's arms to respond to every question. Some of the readers here only check in for a few minutes once a week or so, and not daily or hourly.

[Doug Fielder]

Thank you for spending the time to answer the question and give some good info and input. Yes, it is frustrating that folks won't just throw down a 1 minute answer, but I see it happens all over. I enjoy teaching and will be going back to school soon to get my masters so I can inspire and motivate people into the future like a couple of professors I had did. I was hoping that this post would spark some fun and teach others that there are more than the 40 regular colors out there and well.... Thinking outside the box as they say.

Thank you again.