Different technique

It occurs to me that I have been treating shading between colours as if it was shading between thicknesses, i.e. breaking up the pattern of one colour and filling in the gaps with then next, but colour operates in a different way. In silk shading transitions can be made by mixing colours in the needle, instead of having two strands of a single colour you have one of each. To try it I did a simple series of blocks next to each other.

This works extremely well even changing between colours and it is much smoother than the other technique. To test it further I did one of the shading outwards squares that I tried with black shading as it is slightly more complicated.

Even slightly more complicated shapes work with this kind of shading. However, it does limit you to two strands and doesn't allow for the change in thickness as well as colour which, we have already seen, gives a more dramatic look. I wonder if it would look ok to combine the two techniques with in needle shading used for thicker, darker shades and breaking up the pattern used for thin, light ones?