# Colour Theory?



## Decker (Oct 29, 2010)

I know colours have a method behind them and are not just "Cyan goes excellently with Magenta" but my google-fu talents can only bring me so far and I don't feel like I have learnt much on the subject at hand, if at all.

Anyone out there able to help me on this subject? I frequently find myself pondering the best way to do this and I just draw blanks every time. It puts me off colouring sometimes, that's for sure.


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## Taralack (Oct 29, 2010)

I don't know much about this, but I do know that generally colours on the opposite ends of the colour wheel tend to complement each other nicely.


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## mystery_penguin (Oct 29, 2010)

Split complementary is your best friend. (take a color, look at the complement for it, but use the two colors on either side of it)


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## Zydala (Oct 29, 2010)

Opposites on the color wheel are "complimentary", yes, but only when you want dynamic, stark contrasts in color.

Color theory is INTENSE, but when you get the hang of it, it puts so much life and power into your pieces. :]

Here's some tutorials I found on DA covering the basics. Read them! They overlap but all of them present ideas differently so maybe it'll help you get ideas of how they can all be applied differently.

http://fav.me/d1zx4ie
http://fav.me/d2nzd7j
http://fav.me/d10msg8
http://fav.me/dgzwap

Those are the basics, of course. If you want to play around with colors and how they work together, try surfing http://www.colourlovers.com/ , or try the color scheme designer! http://colorschemedesigner.com/ <--- this thing is really cool, it gives you color palettes based on the different schemes, etc.

If you want some practice on application, try making a picture with a limited color palette - like, three or four colors. Try out this meme, too, and look at some of the great examples that have come out of it! http://fav.me/d2lzsvw


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## Jw (Oct 29, 2010)

Color is something you're going to have to learn how to screw up (and screw up often) before you get it right.

Generally speaking, some tips for you could be this: contrasting colors will stand out. a dark spot on a bright character or moreso a bright spot on a dark character will catch your eyes. If you're wanting the character to bee kinda "flexible" and work well with other colors, you need to make sure the lights and darks are pretty even. 

A black/red character seems out of place on a beach, while a bright yellow character seems out of place on a dark alleyway. Keeping it in the middle gives some wiggle room. 

It helps if you understand the color wheel too. I won't be able to explain it, but here's a neat trick that can teach you about color schemes and maybe give you some ideas of how to go about picking colors. 
http://colorschemedesigner.com/

My best advice is to try coloring as much as possible and make mistakes. See what doesn't work, and pop back in. I'll be happy to give an honest opinion of whether a scheme works or not, and I'll try and give you tips, too.

EDIT: Zydala ninja'd me, but she dropped some good advice.


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## Taralack (Oct 29, 2010)

Thanks for the links Zy.


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## Zydala (Oct 29, 2010)

Glad the links are helpful! :]

Here's some more advanced theory for y'all - good stuff!

http://fav.me/d1xdpvy


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## sunandshadow (Oct 29, 2010)

If you want something to look balanced, as well as picking two colors that go together it's good to pick one that's a warm color and one that's a coool color.  If you want it to look cold pick two cool colors, or hot pick to warm colors.  For example  in this thread Zydala's avatar looks balanced because the two main colors are purple and peach, while Toraneko's looks cold because the two main colors are blue and blue-gray.


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## Jw (Oct 29, 2010)

Oh, some advice I forgot to drop:

Color has three  basic components.

*Hue is the first thing you think about with colors. it's the names you give more commonly-- blue, green orange, etc. 
*Saturation is the vividness of the color. Highly saturated is brilliant, vivid and looks like the true idea of a hue. Unsaturated appears grayish, and is dull looking. 
*Value is the quality of lightness or darkness in a color. It's whether or not it appears to be a tint (whitish) or shade (darkish). 

When these 3 are considered and fixed, a color is created. 

Color Schemes:
[hues listed in brackets like these]


Monochromatic: used mainly for showing a *value* range. Like black and white photography, only with an added feeling or emotion. Great for studies and adding "color emotion" to a piece, weak on creating areas that stand out from the rest of the piece. Appears fairly unnatural. 
[EX: red, red, red, red, red, red]

Complimentary: Used to harmonize between two opposites. There's some wiggle room, but for the most part 2 heavily contrasting hues are used. Great for attention-grabbing, flashy things. Bad for subtlety in general. Also appears unnatural.
[EX: purple, yellow]

Triadic: a combo of thirds on the color wheel. if your wheel has 6 colors, you'll pick each one that is a multiple of 2. More varied. Attention grabbing, but often comes across as preschool looking without some value balancing or variety. Excellent if the colors are desaturated. Bad choice in general for realism because they tend to cancel each other out. 
[EX: red, blue, yellow]

Split complimentary: like triadic and complimentary blended together. it's one of the more natural schemes you can find, as it's seen in nature occasionally. To get this color, you take a complimentary set of hues (like orange and blue) and split one side into it's neighbors. In this case, orange would split into red-orange, yellow-orange and blue. 

This scheme strengthens the single color's impact, and works really well if the split color is used more and the other used as an accent color. Bad for most metallic or unnatural things, good for attention grabbing, moderate on realism.
[EX: red, blue-green and yellow-green]

Triadic: This is like split complimentary times 2. you've gotten both compliments split now. And orange/blue scheme is now red-orange, yellow-orange, blue-green and blue-violet. It's even more natural and a little more flexible than any of the rest, but some of the impact is also lost, too. Honestly, it's my stand-by  color scheme because it tolerates other colors so well. Very poor for metallics, though. 
[EX: blue-green, yellow-green, red-orange and red-violet]

Analogous: the most natural, but once again it's lost a lot of its impact. This is basically a small wedge out of the color wheel. It may be warm, cool, or neutral. Most natural color scheme you can find, superb for skin tones in natural lighting. Great for nature. Requires lots of practice to use well.  
[EX: yellow, yellow-orange, yellow-green and green]

All schemes have a use, you just need to search and play around with them to see how they work. 

Hope that helps too.


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## Zydala (Oct 29, 2010)

sunandshadow said:


> If you want something to look balanced, as well as picking two colors that go together it's good to pick one that's a warm color and one that's a coool color.  If you want it to look cold pick two cool colors, or hot pick to warm colors.  For example  in this thread Zydala's avatar looks balanced because the two main colors are purple and peach, while Toraneko's looks cold because the two main colors are blue and blue-gray.


 
That's a good point to bring up. I don't know if any of the things I linked to talk about it, so here's some things to keep in mind:

"Warm" colors (red to yellows) ADVANCE in a piece, and Cold colors (greens to purples) RECEDE.  Buuuuuuuuut this will change according to what your color choices are. In a piece with deep greens and blues, a reddish purple will be much warmer in comparison and come forward, and in a piece with reds and oranges, a yellow-ish green will seem very cool.

Colors change appearance compared to what they're next to. Take a shade of pure grey, and place it next to a red, and to a blue. The same shade of grey will take on COMPLETELY different feelings and tones - it will look cool next to the red, and warm next to the blue. All colors do this when compared to one another. Your best bet to getting better at these things? PRACTICE :]


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## Decker (Oct 29, 2010)

Wow! That's a lot of stuff to take in :9 Some great tutorials posted and some great tips as well. I'll be sure to use a lot of this stuff!

If you have any more info then keep posting it, because I'll likely be linking my friends to this thread & bookmarking it. :9


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## Arshes Nei (Oct 29, 2010)

http://www.huevaluechroma.com/

Learning the difference between RGB and Pigment is going to help you a lot. Because a lot of information relevant to color theory is also dependent on whether or not you work traditionally or digitally.


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## Elicake (Oct 29, 2010)

http://www.colormatters.com/colortheory.html
That site has a good reference, I don't know if anyone has posted it yet. Everyone seems to be throwing loads of information about color theory at the OP, and I feel that color matters condenses the information nicely.


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## sunandshadow (Oct 29, 2010)

One exercise I found very helpful was to build myself a color palette by sampling art I had done and art I liked that others had done.  http://home.comcast.net/~wickeddelite/collectedcolorpalette.png
It was interesting to see that I regularly paired certain colors with certain other colors - usually starting with one, then experimentally trying others to see what went with it, I tended to arrive at the same eventual choice.  Guess I must like those combinations, lol.  Now if I'm unsure how to color a new piece, I can glance at my personalized color palette for color ideas.


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## savageorange (Oct 29, 2010)

Mypaint is the only digital art program I know with color theory (harmonies etc) built into a color selector. It includes all of the color relations mentioned so far in an easy to access way, so it makes experimenting to see how they work really easy


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## Aden (Oct 29, 2010)

Not posting here to subscribe to this thread, no sir


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## Jw (Oct 29, 2010)

Arshes Nei said:


> http://www.huevaluechroma.com/
> 
> Learning the difference between RGB and Pigment is going to help you a lot. Because a lot of information relevant to color theory is also dependent on whether or not you work traditionally or digitally.



 Sorry for not saying this earlier, but that's a good read. Appreciate the share, Arshes.


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## Arshes Nei (Nov 3, 2010)

http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=17837

http://www.conceptart.org/forums/tags.php?tag=color+theory

http://www.handprint.com/HP/WCL/water.html


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## Saeto15 (Nov 20, 2010)

Check out James Gurney's blog if you need some easy-to-understand tips: http://gurneyjourney.blogspot.com/search/label/Color 

He has a lot of really great information there, and he just released a book on the subject called "Colour and Light".


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## lostfoxeh (Nov 21, 2010)

I have been wanting to know more about this subject as well. When I talked to another artist, particularly about how to lighten and darken colors without using black or white he told me to get a color wheel. Not a printed color wheel but one bought from an art supply store. Then he told me that is used to fin complementary colors, and those will darken a color when mixed together. He also told me there are tons of things that color wheels can do, but I have to get one first. Now cause I can talk to him often he said he would tell me some tricks to use with them, but for you I'd would suggest finding a book to go with your wheel.

Or you can join his videos when he is working on his comics. He host a show about inking comics and other goofy things.
Here is his blog with tons of info. http://www.jonponikvar.com/
He might be giving a color theory tutorial in a few days cause I have been asking for one, but who knows.


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