The Bead Stylist: BeadWork Magazine My Beading Highlights

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Here’s some of what I like in the current issue August / September issue of BeadWork magazine:

On page six under the W.O.R.D section I was impressed by a bead artist named Beth Moser of Williamsport PA for her creativity after being inspired by a dress she saw during Mercedes Benz Fashion Week – after all beads and fashion that’s what it’s all about! I found a photo on her Etsy shop DesignsByBinah

 

Threading your beading needle won’t be such an issue anymore thanks to a great tip from Jacqueline Johnson of Dover, DE .  She has been beading for over 60 years and she has two great suggestions;

• the first is to thread your beading needle with the end of the thread that’s coming off of the thread spool / bobbin and not the end you cut. 
• the second part is something I never would have thought of which is to thread many beading needles at once, then when you need a new thread grab one needle, slide the other down and cut the length of the thread you need the other needles are there when you need them – what a great idea!

And of course there are so a few great beading projects in this issue of BeadWork magazine.

The color theme in this issue is what really caught my attention and I will be posting a summary of that information soon.

Hope you find this useful!

The Bead Stylist: ColorSuckr Online Color Wheel

I discovered this tool which works like a color wheel, but for me it’s much easier, yet for others it may well be a nice compliment to the color wheel.

One of the most time consuming creative aspects of any bead art jewelry designing  is selecting complimentary colors.

And admittedly knowing the ‘technical’ bead colors can also be a challenge when first starting out.

I laugh now, but looking back when I first started out with beads and knowing absolutely nothin’ at the time and before my wonderful customers started educating me, I purchased the largest box of crayons available and if a bead color was close to the crayon color, well I would name the bead had a new name.

From a1 Bead Art Jewelry Supplies Bead Mix Collections I selected a Delica Bead Mix in Caribbean Blue which is a pretty basic extraction, but it will extract the most complex color combinations too.

 

 

It’s really quite simple you just need the url of the photo you would like to extract colors from.

Bead mixes are terrific to work with and one great thing I realized is that when you click on the link to show the color schemes (shown in above picture) you can actually use the schemes to create your own bead mixes.

The ColorSuckr tool will direct you to various websites that will let you use urls of their photo’s but remember you can use any photo url. You can easily create a url of an item by scanning or taking a photo and uploading it to Flickr or Picasa.

If you know of any other tool like this that you would like to share please leave a comment.