adjusting colours to suite value?

[Coyotebreaks]

Im working on a mini at the minute and im trying to acheive a very specific shade of green for one item of clothing. I have found a paint in my collection that is a nice shade, just the right amount of saturation. But it is too light.

I tend to put the midtone down first but for what im planning this is probably going to be closer to a hilight. So im proably going to have to work down to shadows. which is all good, but it means tidying things wont be as easy due to my mid tone no longer being out the pot and sketching lights and darks will be trickyer.

So any way while I have been pondering this problem, I have come to realise that most colours are not going to be exactly right out of the pot. there will always need to be a shift in saturation or value. So Im just wondering what other are doing to adjust these things.

assuming you start with a midtone, Do you mix a new base midtone colour and shade and highlight from there? or do you adjust these things once the paint is on the model? or a mixture of the two.

any thoughts tips and advice will be appreciated .

I guess the short version of the question is, how to get better control over colour and light to make things match whats in the minds eye?

 

[Chaotic Creations]

Varying shades of grey could alter the saturation and tone of the colour. As for your green in question, if it’s a little brighter than you want your mid tone you could always paint it on as a base and tint it back with glazes, and work the colour down into your shades. Lots of glaze layers to get it right down to push the contrast, but if you sketched the deeper shadows in first, perhaps with whatever tonal variation your going to use (if you are planning on doing that), then this could speed up the process. Having tinted the green back, you could then build it back up to this colour in the highlights

 

[Sicks]

There's a couple of ways, adding grey black or white will desaturate and lighten or darken it, you can also use the complimentary colour but this can be difficult, in theory adding red to green will lighten or darken it but it usually goes towards brown for me, I suspect it's because it's difficult to get the exact same lightness and saturation equivalent in two opposite colours. What I would do in your case is wet blend first then glaze between the first shade and first highlight, or mix as a base it'll be a pain but by time you've blended there won't be much of any solid colour left so the mid tone sorts itself out in the process but it does make it more difficult to do easy cleanup

 

[Coyotebreaks]

Thanks for the replys, yes will deffo need to do something along those lines. But I'm also wondering about future projects. I guess it's better to get the midtone right before starting ?

 

[BloodASmedium]

Isually adding a medium grey will keep the color intensity and . Ide either do that or use other types of reds to do so- a medium intensity brown red I think your looking for along the lines of a lighter toned chestnut ink- red stone highlight is what reaper makes. In addition you could , if it’s too light revers adding the green back in will take it back down. It’s just a matter of what you see in your minds eye. What I can say is if your starting with a desaturated color ( not an intense primary) than you should add desaturated colors to the mix to get your color. I use desaturated , mr Maciek uses high intensity colts- together my paints really wouldn’t help him and his tones def wouldn’t help mine as far as mixing to get colors.

 

[Coyotebreaks]

cheers BAM sounds good advice.

On further reflection I have realised that its probably a lack on mindfulness on my part. I tend to pick a paint and allow it to automatically dictate the how light or dark the over piece will be. and allow it to be the middle tone of whatever im doing. I think what I need to start doing is ensure that base colour really is the mid tone of what im trying to do. There are times I try to correct after the fact, but that usually ends up in confusion and going round in circles.