Color Theory Essentials

Color is something that we see. Seeing it depends on several things, including light. Which we can't actually see. Huh? Surely, light is what we see? Nope. Watch this video to find out why.

Primary colors can't be mixed...or can they? Secondary colors are created by mixing two primaries, and then there are tertiary colors. But what's the difference between primaries of RGB and CMY(K)?

RGB colors overlap to produce C, M and Y. And, CMY colors overlap to give you R, G and B. But C, M and Y (plus 'K', black) is a much smaller 'space' than RGB..they are the colors you can print vs. the colors you can see. And that can be very dangerous if you're a graphic designer...

Black and white mix to give you grey. But, so do magenta and green. Really? Really. And they're perfect opposites. Watch the video, and I'll prove it.

The color wheel, a circular arrangement of all the colors of the rainbow, can be used to produce a range of color themes of varying complexity. Monochromatic, the simplest, uses shades of just one color. Others, such as 'split complementary', use several as well as a variety of hues, tints, tones and shades. This video shows you all the options.

There are loads of sites which will help you create your own color schemes. Some rely on the color wheel, some let you upload an image and choose colors from that. Others give you things like font comparison and even tell you if pencils and yarn are available in the colors you've chosen!

An in-depth look at Adobe's very own online color scheme generator. You can use a 'color wheel' approach, or upload an image and choose colors from that. You can also save your scheme to the site, and download other schemes that you like.

Does it matter which color you use to paint, for example, your living room? What do colors mean to us? Can they influence our thinking - and therefore our actions. How are they used in branding?

Can colors persuade us to buy something? This video looks at a practical example of color psychology in marketing, and suggests how these tendencies might have developed.

Adobe Illustrator is a powerful vector graphics program with many amazing features. One of Illustrator's less well-known tools allows you to save colors as a color scheme. This video shows you how, using the Recolor Artwork panel.

Adobe InDesign also has many amazing features and contains one of the best-ever tools specifically intended to help you generate a color scheme. This video looks at both the Eyedropper tool, which picks up one color at a time, and the Color Theme tool - which picks up 5 colors at a time. It also shows you three different ways you can use it.

And finally, if you still can't decide on which colors to use, why not let somebody really qualified help? Like...Rembrandt, for example. Or Michaelangelo. Da Vinci. Picasso. Vermeer. Just pick your favorite artist. And the great thing is, you won't have to worry about copyright issues, at all.