How I do color layering for wood projects

warning I did not intend to make a video out of this till it popped into my head when I was almost done coloring and the video was completely shot free hand so it moves a bit.

With that said I know it’s not the most exciting video since spur of the moment but I get asked often on every color project I do how I achieve some of the colors I do and I always say I layer colors on top of each other so I though I would make a quick video explaining it.

Here are some stills of the color progression and completion seen at end of video:




Just thought I would put this out there just in case it helps someone.

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Nice work!

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An amazing piece of work ! :heart_eyes:

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Thank you.

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What a lovely piece! Very nice job, and thanks for the info.

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Nice! Thanks for sharing as had never thought of using my color pencils before (doh!). Do you seal the work with a clear spray or something?

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I generally don’t seal it as I don’t intend for people to touch it but I have tried sealer before it darkens up some of the colors.

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Hadn’t thought about touching, was mostly thinking about moisture (humidity, fog or even rain if someone doesn’t keep it in a protected area!).

Nice! So you are using regular old color pencils or something a bit more special?

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Yep, just regular old color pencils. If you have a more grainy wood like birch or something you will see the grain lines though.

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Beautiful!

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The muted colors keep reminding me of Monty Python animations…

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If it’s going to see sunlight you’ll want to use some good lightfast pencils as well. Prismacolor are ok. I prefer polychromos myself though those are oil based as opposed to wax based like most pencils. So I’m not sure how wood would suck that up. Now I need to do some testing. :smiley:

I would also add that alcohol based markers are pretty good on wood. Though I wouldn’t use the good stuff. Wood being very porous can drain your markers pretty quickly and Copics are pretty expensive. I use prismacolors and blick studio brush markers. I’ve used those on draft board successfully and the colors are pretty vibrant.

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