Mastering colorimetry is, above all, about ensuring you have a solid foundation for performing your color services! While studied in school, it's common to forget these fundamentals over time. And the importance that colorimetry can have during a coloring or lightening process.
______________
Today, we invite you to review the basic rules together and thus become a true color expert for your clients!
The Color Wheel
The color wheel is first composed of the 3 primary colors, also known as "fundamental" colors: blue, yellow, and red.
Next, we find the secondary or "complementary" colors, distinguished as orange, violet, and green, obtained by mixing the previously mentioned colors.
Important note: each primary color and its complementary color oppose and neutralize each other!
We will delve deeper into this at the end of the article.
The color wheel is therefore based on the mixing of these different colors, allowing for various combinations such as blue-green, red-orange, or even purple. The greater the intensity, the darker the shade: this is why there are different tone levels.
Tone Levels
The tone scale lists the natural shades of hair using a reference number ranging from darkest to lightest.
Determining your client's base color is an essential step in the color service.
The second digit of a hair color formula is used to determine the dominant reflection we want to give to the base color (ash, golden, mahogany, iridescent, or coppery). This choice must be made in collaboration with the client and their preferences. Either to opt for a warm reflection or, conversely, a cool reflection.
The Underlying Pigment
Blonde, in all its forms, is one of the most popular colors in hair salons!
To achieve it, you will therefore have to go through the sometimes stressful step of bleaching, which involves eliminating the hair's natural pigments. When lightening, the hair reveals a color called "underlying pigment." It will therefore be necessary to know the underlying pigments of each tone level well. This will help you achieve an accurate result without undesirable reflections.
Once the underlying pigment is known, you can then opt for the correct neutralizing shade!
Basic Rules of Colorimetry
Here are the basic rules of neutralization that will allow you to achieve the desired blonde shade, without false reflections.
- I want to neutralize an orange underlying pigment = use blue (ash reflection)
- I want to neutralize a yellow underlying pigment = use violet (iridescent reflection)
- I want to neutralize a red underlying pigment = use green
You now have all the necessary information in colorimetry for performing your colorings and bleaches. You can thus satisfy your clientele by offering them the color they dream of!
