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As children, we spend time in school learning about the basics of color. But few of us learn about the fundamentals of color theory. Color theory can be a valuable tool to not only help us understand more about the world around us but also to create harmonious designs or decorate your home. We spend so much time around color that we often assume we know what color is without really thinking about its definition.
At its core, color is perception. Our eyes see something and the data sent from our eyes to our brains interprets it as a particular color. Objects reflect light in different combinations of wavelengths radio, gamma rays, and more. Our brains pick up on these wavelength combinations, interpreting them as a phenomenon known as color. Color theory is the art and science of using color.
It explains how humans perceive color both physically and psychologically and how colors mix, match, and contrast with one another.
List of colors by name
At its simplest, color theory creates a logical structure to something we deal with every day but might not always fully understand or have the proper terminology to discuss in detail. Basically, color theory is the set of best practices for picking colors together for harmonious designs and contextual color combinations. That is the idea that specific color schemes are more appealing to the human eye and depend on the context.
No matter what capacity you work with color in your daily life, having a working understanding of color theory will always come in handy. It also sends an instant message about what your brand identity is. If your branding is a light, diffuse lavender, that sends a very different message than if your branding is all black. We live in fast times, and the message must be transmitted instantly and effectively.
TVs, projectors, and electronics screens use the RGB model and red, green, and blue as their primary colors. This makes RGB an additive, rather than subtractive, color model. Instead of starting with white and subtracting color away from it, RGB begins with black and applies red, green, and blue light sources of varying intensities. The more light you add, the brighter the color becomes.
Any color you see on a physical printed surface uses the CMYK color model. This uses the same color wheel as the RGB model, but make no mistake — these are two different color models.
Colors are produced by subtracting light from paper by adding pigmented ink to a white surface. And unlike RGB, CMYK uses different primary colors because cyan, magenta, yellow, and black let printers produce a wider variety of colors on paper.
Color Palettes for Designers and Artists
The primary colors are red, yellow, and blue. This is a subtractive color mixing model. This means that you start with the white of a canvas or piece of paper, then subtract the light reflected by the paper by adding pigment color paint, crayon, marker, etc. Sir Isaac Newton mapped the color spectrum into a color circle in Today, we call this circle color wheel, which has 12 basic colors.
It organizes the three primary colors, three secondary colors, and six tertiary colors or intermediate colors into a gradient wheel, showing their relation to one another in an easy-to-understand visual model. Today, there are three color wheels — one for each color model.
Color Theory 101: A Complete Color Guide
Artists and designers refer to the color wheel when choosing color schemes for any project that involves color. In order to understand how colors relate to one another, you need a firm understanding of the color wheel. Secondary colors consist of two primary colors mixed in equal amounts. Tertiary colors are created by mixing secondary and primary colors to create new hues.