Colour Theory 2

What is Color? Color is the light reflected from a surface. Visible light is made up of the wavelengths of light between infrared and ultraviolet radiation (between 400 and 700 nanometers). Because water and dust particles in the air scatter light, objects seen at great distance lose contrast, sharpness, and brightness, and have a blue-ish tint. This effect is called Atmospheric Perspective.

Color Models Additive Model Subtractitive Model RGB, Light CMYK, Pigment Note that in actual printing A pure black ink is used because C+Y+M actually results in a dark muddy color.

Describing Color Hue Value Saturation (Chroma) The ‘color’ of the color. Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo, Violet Value Lightness (tint) or darkness (shade) of a color. Saturation (Chroma) Intensity of the hue in the color. Desaturated colors tend to look gray.

HSV Color from a Mac HSV Color Picker HSV Cone from a PC HSV Color Picker

Other Color Models LAB YUV Designed to be device independent. Represents the entire visible light spectrum L = Luminance A = Green to Red B = Blue to Yellow YUV Color Model of European PAL TV standard. Developed for backwards compatibility with Black-and-White TVs Y= Luminance U = Red - Y V = Blue – Y

Color Temperature Temperature can be measured absolutely, or relatively. For example, yellow-green is warmer than cyan-green, but both are cool colors. Absolute color temperatures are denoted below: COOL WARM Colors near the edge between blue and blue-voilet and between yellow and yellow-green could appear as either warm or cold depending on the surrounding colors. Cool colors appear more distant than warm colors due to atmospheric perspective

Color Contrast Contrast Of Hue Contrast Of Value Low Contrast High Contrast Contrast Of Hue Contrast Of Value Contrast Of Saturation

Color Contrast For Text Colors with strongly different hues are easy to distinguish. But reading one on top of another can strain the eyes. A contrast of hue is not enough to make text readable. It needs a contrast of value or saturation, too. Not Good! This is better.

The colors surrounding a color affect its appearance. Color Interaction The colors surrounding a color affect its appearance. The top colors are the same, the bottom colors are not

Common Color Schemes Achromatic Chromatic Grays Monochromatic Analogous Complementary Triadic ANY combination of colors can be a color scheme, but if the colors don’t play nice it will be a BAD color scheme. Using these arrangements and a bit of instinct is usually a safe bet. http://www.efuse.com/Design/palettes.html for color scheme examples

Color Scheme Examples bbc.com fox.com Fox: complementary | BBC: analogous Both look busy because of the number of colors, but do not look terrible because they rest pretty firmly on ‘safe’ color schemes, and use contrasting, readable font colors.

Caress Moisturising Body Wash The Meaning of Color Caress Moisturising Body Wash The moisturising lather and wonderful fragrance pamper your senses and leave your skin feeling silky soft. Irish Spring Original Helps keep you feeling clean and fresh. Great invigorating scent Dial Antibacterial Soap Over 10x more effective at killing disease-causing germs than ordinary liquid hand soaps. Note that a lot of the accent colors look like they belong in the color scheme because they have similar saturation and/or value, and pop because they have complementary hues