When you want to have the color of Cernit (the new formulation) more intense, brighter, and a little lighter after baking (they will darken quite a bit, nature of the clay and it's porcelain effect) and more like the package color that you see. I like to mix it with the 010 white. This is kind of confusing but awesome once I get adjusted to their way of thinking. The Cernit company’s clays are meant to look like porcelain clay and they have a porcelain look to them. It is very close to using a translucent clay. The more I work with this feature instead of fighting it, the better my work looks in it (imho). I will sometimes take a color, say yellow and mix it with a small amount of opaque white 029 and then leave some not mixed with anything and then mix some of the yellow one to one with the porcelain white 010, now I have 3 variations of the same color and when baked they all work together (after all, they are the same color, wonderful for those of you that think you don't know how or are afraid to mix colors), but I have a variation of the same color for a more dramatic effect, as in the flames of the goblet above. Here is another view of the yellows. I have used more than one yellow color and its variations in the flowers though.
Here is an example of a rainbow of colors mixed one to one with the porcelain white 010 or what they just call white.
It is a little hard to distinguish from this photo but you can see the darkening that takes place when you remember that I mixed them in equal parts with what they call white.
This also means that if you want to have the regular colors be opaque you will have to mix all of the colors with a little of the opaque white 029 or with this clay the lines between the colors in the image cane (even though straight and perfect) will appear to be wispy and unclear. The light plays all the way through the clay like frosted glass in this instance.
Or another way to make fabulous canes, because this new formulation of Cernit canes wonderfully well and slices oh so well, is to outline all of the colors with an opaque color or a very dark color, in this way you are isolating the colors or components of the cane which to me will stop the wispy lines, those crooked lines are made by me not the clay. I do this anyway when I cane so it seems very natural to me. The outside packing of this cane is the porcelain white 010 and Biscuit mixed together.
Wow, those flowers are gorgeous! I really like the way they turn out. I have never worked with any clay but I am tempted to give it a try! What brand do you recommend that is inexpensive to learn on but still nice to work with?
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