The reason:
Last year I wrote a blog post called ‘Cameras, Colour Stories and Consulting Mother Nature’ about colour and my work. I revisited it recently because I got stuck on some colour combinations. Totally bogged down in fact. So I decided to go back to basics on Colour Theory as I always find this helps. Colour is a fascinating subject and the more I study it the less I realise I know. There are an infinite number of them for a start, all working in different ways, and that’s before you even get into changing how they look and behave by combining them with others. As it is an important feature of my work I also want to ensure I can understand and use it well.
I have been recording my research, thoughts and ideas as I try to improve my ability to choose, use and put together colour palettes. Keeping these notes means I can refer back again to the basics if I need to, reminding myself of key concepts, before I start to design and select a new palette of colours. On my journey I have also learned more amazing things from Mother Nature (will we ever stop learning amazing things from Mother Nature?) and this still provides a starting point to inspire many of my choices.
As learning about the story and journey behind a piece of art and design helps me to see and understand the work in a new way, I thought it might be of interest if I arrange my notes, ideas and decisions into a series of blog posts. So they start here, in this one. There must be more than one post; otherwise this one will never be finished. To start, I will begin at the beginning and not assume knowledge. The terminology and basics will either refresh what you know or teach you something new; either way I hope you enjoy these posts and learning a little more about my work.
The Notes (part one):
· Colours are depicted in the Colour wheel, which is a visual illustration of the relationships between them. It starts with the primary colours (Red, yellow and blue) in the centre, expands to the secondary (Orange, purple and green) then progresses to the tertiary and includes the colours that fall between, for example green yellow.
The further away from each other colours are in the wheel the more they contrast, or, as I like to think of it, fight one another over who can show up the most. The pairs at opposing sides are the furthest away and called Complimentary colours and they have the highest amount of contrast. I always think this name is misleading though, because if they could speak I doubt they would give each other compliments. More likely they would niggle at each other like siblings with contrasting personalities. Examples are Red and Green, or Orange and Blue.
· Analogous colours are next to each other on the colour wheel. These colours get on with each other. They probably would give each other compliments. The journey from one to the next is subtle and gentle and so when analogous colours are combined the resulting effect is harmonious and soothing.
· A hue is a pure colour or pigment without white or black added.
· A Tint is a hue mixed with white
· Shades are hues mixed with black
· Tones or Saturation means a hue mixed with grey. Saturation is used when talking about digital images, Tone when discussing paintings.
Next:
In the next post I will move onto the basic overview of types of colour palettes and look at what happens when colours begin to be combined.