[Laurence Finston]

I've made some progress on the color chart with the black background. I need to buy a few more of the pastel pencils. I should have just bought the box with all 60 colors in the first place.

I have a folder full of fine paper of various kinds that I've literally had for decades. Since it's all 100% rag and hasn't been exposed to light or moisture, it's all as good as the day I bought it. I'm always glad when I have a reason to get out some fine paper and work with it.

For the color chart on a light background I'm using some charcoal paper from Hahnemühle. It's not always easy to determine which side is the front and I'm not sure it makes a difference with this paper. However, it has a watermark and by checking the Hahnemühle website, I determined that the rooster was facing left so it was the work of a moment to figure out that that was the front side. I marked all the corners on the back side "back" and when I cut or tore the sheet, I marked them on the new, smaller sheets. Actually, that's not quite true, since I forgot when cutting off the last two strips and had to figure it out from the remaining portion of the watermark.

Whenever possible, I prefer to tear rather than cut. I use the folding bone to reinforce the crease, several times while folding the paper the other way around a couple of times. Then, I tear carefully and tear the last bit from the other side. Otherwise, I use an x-acto knife. I hardly ever use scissors except for trimming, gift wrap or cloth.

I used a mask for marking the final cuts to bring the paper down to DIN A4. I'd cut it out of heavy Bristol board and the result doesn't have to be perfect; the sheet just has to fit into an A4 plastic pocket.

I always save every scrap of 100% rag paper. It may be useful for something and if not, then it would make excellent papier-mâché.