Next Crackle Project: Dyeing Plans Begun

The threading plans for the next crackle warp may have changed, but not the plans for the colors. The color plan, brilliant blues against dominant neutrals with flashes of gold and orange, has not changed despite the fact that I absolutely love the deep reds and violets I wove with
in the first part of the current sample.

I know the colors in that photo do not look all that rich and deep, but they are. I had not yet learned how to play with my software to get the photos to show the real thing, to make up for my unskillful photography, in other words! I know that I need to get a tripod so I can stop using automatic settings on the camera, but until I get one, I am grateful for PaintShopPro.

Anyway, whenever I glance at the reds and purples going on to the cloth beam, I am so tempted to throw out my original notion of blues and neutrals. But I am not going to. I am hoping against hope to get a similar rich effect. But instead of the total fabric being rich, I will have the rich, brilliant blues set against the neutrals. Are rich and brilliant contradictory? I don't know.

In any case, I have decided on the colors and the formulas for the colors. As it now stands, I have three different neutrals for the warp: a gray, a brown, and a slightly golden brown, all three in the medium range. What would happen if I used intense colors here? I love intense colors. Should I go with what I love? I might get more the same kind of richness I got on this warp with the reds and purples.

It is so tempting to go with the familiar, with what I love. But staying there will not help me explore new things, discover new possibilities that I might love equally well. So I will continue with the original plan.

For the weft yarns I have these same three neutrals I am planning for the warp plus four more. Also five different blues. For the occasional sparks, I have three red-oranges, two reds and one gold.

These are a lot of variations of colors! This is what I like to do. And having been exposed once again to Randy Darwall's ideas on color, I am strongly motivated to go ahead and do this. It helps that I also love to dye.....

Now I must figure out the amounts I need for each color. To do that, I have to figure out how much warp and weft I will need. Right now these only need to be educated guesses. I intend tol make larger amounts of the dye solutions than I will actually use just to make sure that I do not run out.