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Posts Tagged ‘PrismX11’

Color | 6 Comments

Prism X11 Dark Autumn Palette Review, Part 1

I recently purchased the Prism X11 Dark Autumn palette. This is a new alternative to the True Colour International/Invent Your Image/Indigo Tones palettes already on the market for people who have been draped in or have DIYed a Sci\ART color space. While the other brands’ palettes all look relatively similar–the TCI and IYI ones especially–these look radically different.

The other fans more or less match up with the original Sci\ART fans created by Kathryn Kalisz.
sciartda

There might be a few colors added here or there, but even the order is pretty much the same. The new Prism X11 fans were not created from these palettes, although Nikki Bogardus, the creator, does have original Sci\ART drapes at her disposal and was trained by Kalisz. Instead, they were created in collaboration with a Munsell color scientist, using a Spectrophotometer to determine the exact level of hue, value, and chroma in a given color. Each palette contains 70 “core” colors for your season. I will be doing a color-by-color comparison of the TCI Dark Autumn palette and the Prism X11 palette in another post. Outside of their similarity to Kalisz’s palettes, I am not sure how the exact colors for the other palettes were determined.

palette closed

For this post, I’d like to focus on the PrismX11 palette itself, and how it differs overall from the other palette I have. First, the packaging. It comes in a plastic case that is open on one side. I like this because I’m always misplacing the plastic sleeve my TCI palette came in. I take it out of the sleeve, set the sleeve down somewhere, and then start swatching, completely forgetting where I put the sleeve. The PrismX11 is held together with a fastener that unscrews, enabling you to add more color swatches as they become available, which is an interesting concept. I don’t think these extra colors are available yet, but the expandability is a nice bonus feature. It comes secured with a rubber band–the case is hard and there is extra space for the additional pages. Nikki sells some accessories for the palettes, like tassels in your colors and leather cases, but some kind of elastic band would also be maybe a nice thing to add as an option.

palette open

The palette itself is printed on thick glossy paper, rather than the canvas of the TCI palettes. The colors seem much more complex and rich than the canvas ones, but I’m not sure if it’s better for fabric swatching, due to the difference in material.

palette full

The palette also has more features than the TCI palettes. It even has an index. The extras include information on the season from Kathryn Kalisz (including some information on design lines!), which I really like having, plus the names of colors she mentioned for the season. It also has a visual representation of the season’s hue/value/chroma settings, which I’m assuming replicate the settings for the Spectrophotoometer.

palette contents

The palette definitely has a darker and more muted feel than the other palette I have. Partially it’s because the darker colors are at the top of the fan. Some Dark season people prefer this, because they find their darkest colors to be the most important. I like to have it the other way around. The light colors are the hardest to get right, and the worst when they’re wrong–for me, anyway. It also just makes the palette seem darker and heavier than it actually is. I’ll go more in depth on this in my next post, but while it looks a lot darker than the other palette, a lot of the colors are very similar–it just doesn’t have the lightest and brightest of the TCI DA fan’s colors, nor does it have an icy strip.

My overall thoughts, so far, are that I’m excited to have two options as far as Dark Autumn palettes go. I’m not sure if I would have picked this up if I didn’t want to review it and see if there were a decent option beyond the fan I already own, but now that I have it, I think it’s good to know that there is a scientific basis for these particular colors being on the palette. I will go more into the colors and how they compare to the other fan in my next post, but they are less overwhelmingly dark than it may seem from photographs or from your first impression, and I think a lot of DAs are going to find this a better option, especially if they struggle with certain aspects of the other DA palettes (i.e., the lighter and brighter colors are difficult for them to wear). I feel like our makeup options are represented better on this palette, too.

The fans can be ordered directly from the PrismX11 website and cost 54 USD. Shipping is $3.99 within the US. When I tried to order from the site, it said shipping to Europe was also $3.99, and since that didn’t make sense to me, I contacted Nikki, and she told me shipping was $13.50 and I placed my order with her personally via email. So if you’re in the US, it’s significantly cheaper than buying from TCI, whose fans are $60, but if you’re in Europe, it’s about the same.

Nikki also sells a book with the colors from all the palettes, which I think is a great tool for DIYers or for the merely color-obsessed.

Part 2 of my review, with color comparisons to the TCI palette, will be up Friday.

Color, Personal | 0 comment

On My Color Experience

I got the PrismX11 palette in the mail yesterday, and I’m really excited to be able to share this palette with everyone. Before I do, though, I thought it was necessary to clarify some things about my experience with and approach to color, in case some people haven’t been reading from the beginning.

I’m going to be reviewing the Dark Autumn palette, and comparing it to the True Colour International version. I think it’s important for people to know that I have never been draped as anything. I came to Deep Autumn completely on my using, using the Color DIY process I have outlined.

So I don’t make any judgments in my review as to how this palette works for me as a Dark Autumn. People who practice Caygill have told me that they see me as something between Spring and Autumn. I have heard between “light spring and soft autumn.” This means, I think, that I am a lighter person, on the warm side, but too muted for Light Spring. Soft Autumn is too muted. I think I ended up in Dark Autumn as a need for an autumn that is brighter than SA.

I don’t know if this is what a color analyst would see if I sat in the draping chair and under the lights. I find that the Dark Autumn colors feel right on me, the makeup works on my face, and I think they are right for my energy.

I do find, generally, that dark colors are easier for me to wear than light ones. The wrong light color reacts horribly with my complexion. A dark color that is too cool makes me look a little gray but nothing too noticeable; the wrong light color makes me look hungover.

TCI (left) and PrismX11 (right)

TCI (left) and PrismX11 (right)

You can see that the very brightest DA colors (mainly the ones at the top of the TCI palette) are the ones that are missing from the new palette. These colors work well for me, as a lighter person, but I know that a lot of other DAs struggle to make these colors work and stick to the darker colors in the palette. If I were going by the color selection alone, as a lighter person, I’d probably go with TCI for myself, although I love the new purples and greens the PrismX11 has. I think most draped DAs, however, are darker than I am, and will find the absence of the colors I mentioned and overall increased dark impression of the PrismX11 palette to be a welcome change.