Swatches!

Swatches! I usually create swatches when I create a new colour that I love and then I might explore that colour in my sketchbook for a while. However the way I am going to tell you about today is a more traditional way of creating swatches. The children in after school art club had a go at this yesterday too and this was my demo which I did at the same time as the children. Take 2 colours which you know will go together, like green and yellow, green and blue, pink and red, orange and yellow - you get the idea! First create a swatch in the main colour - here I've used leaf green, next add a little of the other colour, mix them and create your second swatch. Then each time add a little more of the second colour, here I have chosen lemon yellow. Keep going until you get nearer to the second colour - you could do this in tiny steps and have lots of variations in between but for quickness at art club we did 6 steps.

Below these swatches I create a new swatch exploration, this time still using the same first colour, leaf green but now adding small amounts of white.

Swatching can be a really informative process for paintings and future work - you can keep a book of swatches or cut them all up into small pieces and write the colour combinations on the back. Swatching can also be a really relaxing warm up process if you feel a bit stuck and fancy painting but don't know where to start.

Anyway, let me know if you try it. Oh and just to say this is acrylic paint but you could do the same with watercolour and oils.

Enjoy!