Neutral Grey Backdrop for Colour Analysts
May 12, 2012 by Christine Scaman
The things that come so easily to some people that seem such a big obstacle to others are a fascination to me.
When I talk about traveling PCA, scheduling, finding suitable rooms from afar, and getting all the stuff into suitcases, Nikki Bogardus (of My Color Rx who already does traveling PCA) and my brother both pause, frown a little, tip their head sideways about 20 degrees, and look at me like “What exactly is the problem? Just pick up the phone.” Nikki is far too polite to come out and say that but my brother isn’t.
When I talk to my friend Carol about traveling PCA and needing a portable way to neutralize the colours of the various rooms I might find myself in, I recognize that she’s giving me that very same look. Carol is the DIY Queen. Clever, crafty, resourceful, manufacturing processes never stump her. Her brain engages. You can see she thrives on it.
Get thee to a plumbing shop.
Buy 3/4″ elbows, end plugs, 2-way and 3-way couplers, and PVC pipe.
My dimensions were to be 4 – 6′ wide and 6-8′ high.
Every piece is cut to 25″ or less to fit in a suitcase.
You could put it in its own duffel bag and check the luggage separately. The material is tough.
Bill suggested gluing each coupler to one end of pipe with PVC Cement to avoid loose couplers rolling around, strengthen the structure so it doesn’t fall apart when it’s moved, and make assembly easier and faster. The pipe would need to be cut a little shorter depending on your suitcase size.
Buy neutral grey fabric to flip over it. If you want to be very meticulous to detail, you could add Velcro straps to the sides to fold the fabric around the pipe stand. Do buy enough fabric to create a double thickness of curtain so no light or colour can shine through. If you spent some money on thicker upholstery type fabric, you could make this really quite beautiful. Mine is just cotton broadcloth.
Coolness, ay? Cost me $56.
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8 Responses to “Neutral Grey Backdrop for Colour Analysts”
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OH MY GOODNESS COME TO LOS ANGELES OR PHOENIX!!!!!
Or Omaha or Kansas City! I’ll have appts lined up for you for days!
)
Christine, Nikki should have told you that she doesn’t use any gray backdrop of sorts. She must have been astonished at your pernickety. She finds it doesn’t change the results. Anybody who has been draped by her in London will confirm it, I believe. Actually I think I quite agree with her, distrustful though I have become about Sci/art palettes. I understand in case you don’t want to publish this.
I would love to visit everyone. US work permits can be hard to get but I’ll visit with an immigration lawyer once I figure get the traveling sorted in Canada.
Aurelia
- of course, I’ll publish your comment. First of all, I appreciate all critique hugely (and much more than praise). It keeps me honest
What you said is important to let me emphasize that the post isn’t directed to any particular analyst. I’m really only sharing how I solved a problem. Every analyst understands how they work best given the space they have. Nikki and I have often discussed the necessary stage for a proper PCA, understanding that your only ideal setting will be the one you create and control fully at home. At one of my travel locations, I use daylight and grey covers for the windows only if the sun comes out, and like Nikki, I know for sure that the colour rendering is correct.
And I would say that everyone is astonished at my pernickety-ness. Well, maybe almost everyone. I’m pretty sure there are a few who think I oversimplify and popularize too much. Ah, well. I is what I is.
I do thank you for taking the time to share your thoughts.
I use two grey twin bed sheets. I can either tack them (gently) to the ceiling moulding or drape them over a dressing table in front of the mirror. I don’t carry a frame. Very easy.
Just curious (did I miss something back there?)– How do you know if your grey material is neutral?
Mary Steele,
I remembered you saying that in the past and I’ve looked everywhere for those sheets, but I’ll have to buy fabric. The tacking idea is good. Much as I like being fully independent, your idea is much easier.
Kathryn,
Not known you to ever miss anything and you didn’t this time. It’s a good Q you ask, one I’d like to discuss with someone more knowledgeable than I. A neutral grey would be one that had no element of blueness, pinkness, mauveness, yellowness, nothing that could generate a colour reaction in the skin. For the purposes of something behind the mirror, to neutralize the room paint, I think eyeballing such a grey would be fine. The eye can pick up very small degrees of saturation. Besides, I’ll be in hotel meeting rooms where I can’t control every variable anyhow.
The Q is have is “How is Neutral Grey” made as opposed to Winter’s grey that’s composed of B&W? Well, let’s see.
1. Neutral colours from the Season palettes contain all 3 primaries.
2. You can see the difference, the Winter one is sharper than the Neutral.
3. I wonder if the Neutral is made using all 3 primaries or 2 complements to the point where they perfectly cancel each other.
4. If you took a can of white paint and added Black 9 parts, Red 2, and Yellow 2, that would make Neutral Grey paint. Are they using black instead of blue, rather like melanin in human pigmentation? They have to cool if off somehow because red and yellow make warm greys. I wonder why black and not blue?
5. In Photoshop, you would make an 18% gray with a saturation of 0%. So, the sat level is definitely desaturated as far as possible to have no colour contribution.
6. In CMYK colour space, you’d use Cyan 17, Magenta 13, and Yellow 13, with K(black) at 0. So, that a blue/red/yellow way of going about it.
7. I wonder what was wrong with plain B&W in the first place? It must not cause any colour reaction with the skin and I expect it makes too cool of a grey, perhaps having a bluish appearance as W grays can.
8. Neutral gray must mean as Neutral Season, having contribution from warms and cools both. So it’s not only colour neutral, it’s heat neutral too. You can get quite light and dark ones (so it’s not value neutral) and the sat is zero (so it’s not chroma neutral).
As I said, a conversation I’d love to have with someone versed in the subject. And that’s the long answer to your Q to the best that I know.
I’ve wondered the same thing – what qualifies as “neutral” grey for this purpose.
These PVC pipe-based stands are much like what the photographer used for her backdrops, who came to photograph my newborn. In fact, I don’t know how much those stands cost as compared to the PVC parts, but I would think you could buy one of those portable backdrops, as well. (They may even come in grey but you could certainly drape them.)