COLOR THEORY: Lecture Notes
Color is an enormous topic. We are constantly processing visual information based on color references.
Since 1676, when Issac Newton analyzed sunlight through a glass prism and the color it produced, many color theories have been put in place. It should be mentioned that color theory is just that, theory. For centuries people came to understand and use color based on their inherent perceptions and emotional responses. Theory helps us to understand their practices and our own perceptions. I like to teach from a book by Johannes Itten called THE ART OF COLOR. Again, this is a highly theoretical text, but it serves as a well organized place to start.
The Color Wheel
Start by understanding the three color wheels.
The first is produced with primary colors. These are to be the basic building blocks and therefore, all color extends from mixtures of these three colors. Conversely, this means that these colors cannot be produced by any other color.
Primary colors: red / yellow / blue
The next is a color wheel with primary and secondary colors. Secondary colors are the result of the combination between the primary colors
Secondary colors: orange / green / violet
The third is a color wheel showing the twelve tone scale of primary, secondary and tertiary color. These are the colors the fall between the different grades of primary and secondary colors
Tertiary colors: yellow orange / red orange / red violet / blue violet / blue green / yellow green.
The twelve tone scale: yellow / yellow orange / orange / red orange / red / red violet / violet / blue violet / blue / blue green / green / yellow green
After all the wheels are in place, we need to examine the various forms of color contrast.
Hue, Brightness, Cold-Warm, Complementary, Simultaneous, Saturation, Extension. To get us started, I like to focus on HUE | SATURATION | BRIGHTNESS. These are important ways of understanding how to manipulate color. The ADOBE ILLUSTRATOR interface makes these manipulations remarkably simple.
OUT OF CLASS WORK
Just to get us started, use the HSB palette in Illustrator to create 12 color blocks showing all the colors in the color wheel mentioned above.