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Tuesday, October 21, 2003

Color Basics

Dan Boyarksi gave some of us a quick lecture on the basics of color.

There are three main properties of every color: the hue, the value (or brightness), and the intensity (or saturation). Hue is the color itself. Value indicates how much black is in the color; how dark or light it is. Intensity is how pure or dull the color is.

When picking a suite of colors, try to keep them all at around the same value. Look for equal values and saturation. To dull a color, add in color from the opposite side of the .

White backgrounds tend to darken up colors. Black backgrounds tend to lighten colors. Try backgrounds that aren't pure white or black. White backgrounds can even deaden colors, so try a light grey. Very pale yellow backgrounds with black type is good for older eyes.

Painter Josef Albers said that color doesn't exist until it meets another color. "If you remember one thing from this lecture," Dan said, "Remember to look at the edges of colors and see how they work together."

posted at 08:45 PM in design 101 | comments (0) | trackback (0)

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