Posted by Megan Terry
OCS Canada Educator Jessika Guy gives a presentation on how to use the mixed tones shades from the OCS permanent colour line. Keep reading for a transcript of the class.
Let's get into it. So what to expect today? I'm going to touch on what are the mixed tones, when should you use them, why aren't they on the color chart and how do they support gray coverage.
So here are the mixed tones. We have the 4MO, the 6TO and the 8CA and also gray. So MO, TO, CA are all located on the same panel in the color chart, and gray you can find on the concentrate section of the color book.
And when you flip to the back of your color book you will see this beautifully designed color wheel that shows all of the natural tones and where they sit and then all of the OCS shades and where they sit. And also at the bottom of that page you will see that it indicates that these colors, the gray, MO, TO and CA are not found on the color wheel. Let's talk about why.
So the mixed tones are considered to be full spectrum shades. So what does that mean? It means that they have a little bit of all of the different tones within them. So they all have gold, they all have copper, they all have red, they all have violet, they all have blue, they all have green.
And this is why they're defined as a mixed tone because they are a mix of all of the tones within. But something to consider is the level. So when you are looking at your 4MO, the 4 is indicating that it sits at a level 4. The 6TO at a level 6 and the 8CA at a level 8. And the gray indicated just to the side of it is the 6.5. So in between a 6 and a 7. So this is when we can refer back to the predominant underlying tone chart.
So a natural level 4, the underlying pigment is violet red. So when you are looking at the 4MO on the swatch chart, you will, when you look at it, it does read with some of those violet red pigments. Those are the pigments that kind of jump out immediately.
Now that being said, there are all of the other tones within there. But because level 4 is happiest and the richest and the fullest when it has those red violet tones to them, or sorry, the violet red tones to them. So when you want to create a cooler or warmer, you have to take that underlying pigment into consideration.
So that's the magic of hair color. We get to manipulate what direction that we want to take the hair, to push the hair. So are we using the violet red or are we trying to eliminate it completely? And that's one of those fun things about color formulation is once you begin to understand what you're working with and where you're going and how you want to get there, all of these tools in the OCS toolkit, like the mixed tones can make color formulating really satisfying and really easy to navigate.
So when you are trying to use them in a formula, just understanding that they have some of that underlying pigment within them at the level that they sit. So the 4MO has the violet red, the 6TO has the red orange, and the 8CA has the orange yellow. The gray sort of goes against this theory in that there is a cooler option here within the mixed tones.
So we have something else we can lean on to help neutralize or cool down some of our target shades. So when do we use them? So if you love the color that is on that swatch, you can use that as a target shade. You can use that in your formulation as a target color to get to.
You can use it for filling. So going from a blonde to a brunette or a lighter shade to a darker shade, needing to incorporate some of the full spectrum color in order to get that full rich tone. They're great for that.
They already have all of that pigment within each of them. So it's a great place to start in your formulation. And gray coverage support.
This is where I probably use them the most. Gray, and I'm talking 50% gray to 100% white, is where sometimes we can lose some of that depth and richness to our colors because we are navigating a low-tox color brand. We need to think about things just a little bit differently.
We need to go kind of back to the true color formulation artistry. So when you are dealing with someone who is 100% white, there's no pigment there. There's nothing left in the hair.
And if that client who is 100% white wants to be a level four, there's a lot you have to do to a lot of color, I should say, that you need to add to create a rich level four. So I like to explain this also in the way of an opposite way, which all of us can kind of relate to where if someone is a level two and they want to be a level 10, they have to go through all of those underlying pigments of every level as they climb to that level 10. So if we just go back to this chart here, so if they're at a two, they're going to, you're going to expose violet, red, orange, and yellow before you are able to get them to that pale yellow place.
If you can get them to that pale yellow place, depending on what they've got going on with their hair. But in theory, you need to travel through all of those underlying pigments to get to your blonde or end result. It's the same when you're working with gray, but in the opposite direction.
So you need to have all of the colors above your target level in order for that color to have full depth, full richness. So for example, you have someone who is pure white and they want to be a level five, you need to have red, orange, and yellow in your formula. Otherwise, it's not going to be a full, rich tone.
It's going to be a bit translucent. It's going to be a bit wishy-washy. And that in itself is okay.
If that's what you're trying to achieve, if your client loves a more translucent result, because for various reasons, that can be an excellent option. But if it's someone who is looking for that full coverage, rich depth, then you need to make sure that all of those pigments, all of those tones are within your color formula. And this is where the mixed tones come in super handy.
So you can have with your gray coverage, you want to have 50% of your formula being that NN series, and then you move over into your target shade. My suggestion is that a quarter of your target shade is part of that is from the mixed tones. So here's a little swatch example that I did.
So my original swatch was, it's looking a little more blonde on this screen, but it was an 80%, 85% gray swatch. And so I did three different swatches. And on the first one, I used only 6NN with 20 volume rapid.
The second swatch, I used 50% 6NN, 50% 60AH with the 20 volume rapid. And then the third swatch that I used, I did the formulation was 50% 6NN, a quarter 60AH and a quarter 4MO plus the 20 volume rapid activator. So as you can see, when you are kind of glancing at these swatches, the original swatch, the 6NN on its own, nothing wrong with that, but you can see that it is a little translucent.
It's not quite reading like a true 6, it's got a little, it's a little weak. And then in the second swatch testing where I added in some, a little more, a little more pigment family. So adding in some of that green pigment family, the 60AH, it's starting to fill out a little bit.
There's a little more, you can start to see a little more richness happening in that, in that tone. And then over in the third swatch, I have 50% of the 6NN, quarter 60AH, quarter 4MO. And we've got a beautiful, rich, full looking color here.
Could I have used the 6TO in this formulation? Sure, I could have. But what I know about OCS is that sometimes adding a little bit of depth or a little darker shade when we're doing gray coverage or working on gray coverage helps to fill that out. There's more, more pigment, you know, packed into a darker shade than there is in a lighter shade.
So if I'm, if I'm looking for really rich and, and full looking color for my client, then I'm going to drop down in my mix tones as opposed to dropping down in my NNs or my target shade. I choose to drop down in my, in my mix tones. So it gives me a little bit more of that richness and depth in a full spectrum type of way.
So that is a little bite into the mix tones. If you have any questions around that, please feel free to reach out to me anytime. Of course, if you're to order some of these colors, you can find them at the NPC distribution website and find me on Instagram, tag me in your, your color formulas.
If you start using some of these mixed tones, I'd love to see your work. I'd love to share it. And we, we really hope that you enjoyed this video and you got something out of it and yeah, I hope to see you in real life soon.
If you would like to watch this class, it's available on our Youtube page.
