Want to Make Your Artwork Pop? Here’s How to Effectively use Colour Theory
Ever wonder why your drawings don’t pop? A simple colour palette fix can bring your piece to life. It’ll make all your pieces more aesthetically pleasing.
You’ll be able to give your drawings a face-lift after reading this article.
Colour Definitions
When talking about colour there’re three main categories you should be familiar with. I’ll give a brief overview of each.
Colour Theory
People associate colours with feelings. If you choose the right colour scheme you can evoke the desired emotion towards your viewers. Never underestimate the power of colours. I’ll be going over the main colour theories in a simple and easy to remember way. These theories are great for creating full-colour palettes.
- Analogous: these are a set of three colours that are next to each other on the colour wheel. Analogous is also known as adjacent colours because of the three colours all next to each other. For example green, yellow, and orange
- Complimentary: two colours opposite to each other on the colour wheel. For example green and violet.
- Triadic: Three colours that are evenly spaced around the colour wheel (forming a triangle when connected). For example, the most common triad are: red, blue, and green.
- Split complementary: this is a base colour and two colours adjacent to its complement. (Basically, you take the base colour, find its compliment and then find the two colours next to it). For example Yellow, Red-Violet, and Blue-Violet
Bonus: Tetradic: two pairs of complementary colours
App to help Remember the Theories
To make things easier I found a useful app to help you with finding a palette in line with the theories. The app is called “colour harmonizer” Here’s how it works
- When you open the app you’ll see a colour wheel
- Choose desired colour theory from the drop-down menu
- Pick a colour from the colour wheel and its respective colour theory will choose the colours
- The hexadecimal values of each colour appear under the colour wheel
Let me know if you take into account colour theories in your drawings, I’d love to hear more about your workflow.
Originally published at http://artstarttech.art.blog on January 5, 2020.
