A New Challenge at Copic Creations: Saturated Colors

Hey, all!  How's this week treating you?  It's been busy at my end of the keyboard, but that's okay...it keeps me from getting into trouble and that's a good thing ;D  It sure is nice to see the weekend finally make an appearance, though.  September has come to an end and October has arrived, bringing with it the Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta.  If you've never made the trek to NM to witness this visual feast for the eyes, I highly encourage you to do so.  It is a breathtaking experience like no other, partly because on average there are between 700 - 1000 balloons participating each year and also because it's one of the very few ballooning events where everyone is allowed down on the field while the balloons are being inflated.  Imagine this...one minute you're standing amongst these enormous balloons laid out for display like beautiful canvases on the ground and the next minute they magically bloom and your suddenly lost in a hot air balloon garden, alive with color, balloons dancing all around you.  Moments later, they launch and become a vivid watercolor accent against a dazzling blue New Mexico sky.  I can't even come close to verbally recreating the experience.  You'll just have to see for yourself some day ;)

After several years of attending this event faithfully, we typically only go now when we have guests in town.  We still, however, reap its glorious benefits because each morning the balloons can be seen floating above Albuquerque from most parts of the city.  It's a wonder the traffic accidents don't "balloon" (haha, couldn't help myself!) during this time, because most of the drivers heading to work are busy looking skyward rather than keeping their eyes on the road.  The view is pure inspiration, because the balloons are saturated in color, which leads me right into this week's challenge...Saturated Colors.

In a nutshell the challenge this week is to use Copic colors that fall in the saturated area of the Copic Color Chart.  This sounds a tad vague, but if you review the breakdown of the Copic Color System, it makes more sense.  The system usually consists of 1 or 2 letters followed by 2 or 3 or 4 numbers.  The letters refer to the color family (B = blue, G = green, BG = blue green, etc.).  The first number following those letters refers to Color Saturation.  Saturated colors are more pure and therefore will usually be more intense.  They are located on the outside of the Copic Color Chart and are usually identified with a 0, 1, or 2.  As you move closer to the center of the chart, more gray has been added making the color appear darker, but not quite as vibrant as the pure (saturated) colors located on the outside circles of the color chart.  These are considered unsaturated colors and that first digit will increase accordingly.  Here's a link to blogpost by Beverly Gilbert who explains the theory so much better than I can, plus she has tons of pretty pictures on her site.  The third digit refers to brightness, but we'll save that explanation for another post.    

For my card I used an image by Elizabeth Bell designed for Belles and Whistles, who just happens to be our sponsor for this challenge.  She is called Pen Pal and I colored her up in saturated colors keeping with our theme this go round.  Drop down to the end of the post to see the colors I used.  Stop by the challenge blog to see the exquisite designs the other team members created.  To play along with this challenge, grab that color chart, identify some vibrant, saturated colors and color up something special to share with us over at Copic Creations.  We can't wait to see what you make!

Copics used:
skin - E11, E00, E000, R20 
hair - E15, E13, Y21, Y00 
shirt - R29, R22, R20, Y15 
jeans -  B23, B21, BG10
ground - E57, E31, E50 (Oops!  I cheated;D  Not saturated colors.) 
halo around image -  B01, B000, B0000