MMA 131: Color Theory and Relationships

Color Theory

• Color contrasts and interactions are essential in design, art, and visual communication.
• Understanding color relationships helps create effective designs and applications.

Color Contrasts

• Hue Contrasts:
  • Primary colors have the strongest contrasts.
  • Tertiary colors have the weakest contrasts.
  • Examples of hue contrasts can be seen in indigenous art, folk art, modern art, and design.
• Light-Dark Contrast:
  • Colors appear lighter on a dark background and darker on a lighter one.
  • Contrasts between color values are often observed in monochromatic works.
  • Example: Picasso's Blue Period paintings.
• Contrasts in Saturation:
  • Pure colors produce high visual contrast.
  • Adding gray to a hue decreases its saturation.
  • Color has intrinsic value, and different colors have different values when converted to grayscale.
• Warm and Cool Contrast:
  • Red to yellow colors are often labeled as warm, while green to blue are cool.
  • Colors that are next to each other have the weakest contrast.
  • Cooler colors are commonly used to paint shadows.
• Complementary Contrast:
  • Pairs of colors that are sitting opposite of each other in the color wheel.
  • When combined, they create neutral gray or brown.
  • Three primaries or a primary + a secondary produce a neutral gray.
• Simultaneous Contrast:
  • A color can look brighter or duller depending on the background or context it is in.
  • The viewer's eyes are fooled that the colors of the inner squares are not the same.
• Extension:
  • Deals with the relative proportion of areas of color in order to create balance.
  • Balancing of colors' visual weight by adjusting their amounts.

Color Perception and Interaction

• The Interaction of Colors:
  • Colors are in a continuous state of flux and can only be understood in relation to the other colors that surround them.
  • To Albers, color is "the most relative medium in art."
  • How people see color is highly subjective and varies dramatically between individuals.
• Principles of Color Interaction:
  • Simultaneous Contrast
  • Light-Dark
  • Color Complement Contrast
  • Subtraction
  • Color Constancy
• Important Terms:
  • Factual and Perceived Colors
  • Halation
  • Color Constancy

Color and Light

• Atmospheric/Aerial Perspective:
  • The effect the atmosphere has on the appearance of objects when looked at from a distance.
  • Objects further in the distance tend to decrease in contrast and saturation, and shift to cooler colors.
• Backlighting:
  • Positioning the main light source for a photograph behind the primary subject.
  • Used to create dramatic lighting, powerful, moody, simplified, or emotional.
• Film Noir:
  • A film genre that uses low-key lighting and chiaroscuro lighting techniques.
  • Emphasis on lights and shadows, stylized, emotional, and melancholic.
• Flat Lighting:
  • Created by using even lighting conditions, losing any casted shadows that may give depth to an image.
  • Flat lighting can make a scene feel melancholic, sad, or somber.
• Natural Lighting:
  • Uses the sun as a source of light.
  • Available light from the sun varies with the time of day.
• Golden Hour:
  • A period shortly after sunrise and shortly before sunset noted for its warm light.
  • Soft and warm lighting blurs imperfections in portraits and can help tap into emotions like nostalgia and happiness.
• Reveal Lighting:
  • Uses overcast lighting to create soft shadows and lights, giving it a dulled-out, somber feel.
• Spot Lighting:
  • Focuses all of the light in a scene in one area/spot or from a single light source.
  • Creates a dramatic effect since it employs chiaroscuro.
• Underlighting:
  • Lighting a subject below their face, grabbing the viewer's attention because strong lighting does not usually come from below.
  • Commonly used to suggest a magical, sinister, or dramatic feeling.
• Mood Lighting:
  • Creative use of color and light to set the mood or target emotion in a setting.

Basic Color Harmonies

• Achromatic:
  • A colorless scheme using black, gray, and white only (values).
• Monochromatic:
  • A color harmony that uses tint, tone, and/or shade of just one hue.
• Analogous:
  • A color harmony that uses two to four colors that are adjacent to each other on the color wheel.
• Complementary:
  • A color harmony that uses two colors that sit directly opposite each other on the color wheel.
• Split Complementary:
  • A color harmony that uses any color with the two colors either side of its complement.
• Triadic:
  • A color harmony that uses any three colors that are equally spaced from each other on the color wheel.
• Tetradic:
  • A color harmony that uses any four colors that intersect as corners of a quadrilateral on the color wheel.
• Square:
  • A color harmony that uses any four colors that are equally spaced from each other on the color wheel.

Other Color Harmonies

• Color Discordance:
  • Deliberately breaks from conventional color harmony schemes.
  • In visual media, it is often used to refocus viewer attention to a specific person, place, or thing.
• Vibrating Colors:
  • Bright colors can cause an afterimage effect where the afterimages interfere with one another, causing a "visual vibration" or motion.