Collins Cambridge International A Level Digital Media

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Skills and methods

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7 Colour Theory Learning objectives: By the end of this unit you will be able to: • Explain how colours are perceived • Explain the factors influencing the psychology of colours • Understand how colours are created • Understand different colour models and how they are used in different media • Understand and use different colour rules and effects

7.1 COLOUR MEANING AND PSYCHOLOGY Colour is principally used to add value and meaning to any visual communication. It can be used to harmonise and organise graphic elements and information and when used effectively, colour intensifies a visual message making it much more immediate and identifiable. The considered and appropriate use of colour can increase the speed of comprehension of the image or product, establish emotional themes, and produce instantaneous and memorable associations in the mind of the viewer. However, colour isn’t always easy to understand – it is very subjective, everyone has a favourite!

But if you can grasp the basics and appreciate the importance of influencing factors such as culture, environment and association in people’s response to colour, you will succeed in using it to enhance your digital projects.

HOW WE PERCEIVE COLOUR

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Fig 7.1 Diagram of an eyeball in cross-section.

We perceive colour when our eyes receive signals from the outside world in the form of visible light. Light travels in waves and the distance between the crests of two waves of light is called a wavelength. The technical term for a colour is a hue. Different wavelengths create different hues within the visible spectrum of light. For example, blues have shorter wavelengths than reds.

The eye processes light via a series of receptor cells called rods and cones which are located at the back of the eyeball. These send signals to the brain via the optic nerve. Rods allow us to distinguish forms in dim light but only in black and white while cones allow us to perceive colour hues. There are three types of cones, which separately perceive red, green and blue light. These cells together allow us to identify millions of colours and to differentiate between them. (Some animals can see parts of the light spectrum humans cannot, for example bees and butterflies see ultraviolet light).

THE PSYCHOLOGICAL EFFECTS OF COLOUR Colours provoke powerful emotions. The way that people react to colour goes beyond the purely physical response and the psychological aspect of their reaction is often much stronger. For example, the colour lavender is in sensory terms simply a light purple. But if it suggests to you a feeling of nostalgia, then a psychological element is involved in your response too.

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Part 2: Colour theory Humans respond to colour psychologically on various levels and derive meaning from it in various ways, from its associations with nature, to links with society’s history and culture, to individual experiences and emotions. Experts agree that universal, cross-cultural perceptions of colour exist– for example orange means warm or green means nature for almost everyone wherever they come from. –However, there are more culturally-specific associations – for example black means death in western societies but in China white is associated with death. Individual responses are more complicated to analyse and understand. When two people look at the colour lavender and in one it evokes a sense of nostalgia, while the other thinks of a painting by Vincent Van Gogh, these responses are based on experiences and emotions particular to those two individuals.

COLOURS IN CULTURE Word association studies using colour samples have demonstrated that most people from the same cultural background will associate given colours with the same ideas, objects and feelings. Show most people in the West a strong red and they will associate it with fire, passion, excitement, blood and danger.

They will perceive the temperature of the colour as hot. Show them a sample of a light, bright blue and they will almost certainly associate it with the word “sky”. Other shades of blue will evoke further typical associations such as “sea”, “water”, “clean”, “calm”, and the temperature will usually be perceived as cool. However, research shows that in many eastern countries these associations are not quite the same. Bright blue is also associated with fire, because a very hot flame (a gas flame for example) can also be this shade of blue. In these cultures only dark blue would be associated with the sea.

Designers need to be aware of the cultural associations of their target users and take these into consideration when making decisions about colour usage.

David McCandless has researched how different cultures associate different meanings to colours and created the “Colours in culture” diagram below.

Skills Task: Associating colour Show five friends or family members (ideally from a variety of cultural backgrounds) a selection of different colours and ask them to write down words that they associate with the colours.

1. Do they all use the same words, or are there noticeable differences?

2. Can you identify any cultural differences in the interpretations?

3. Do some interpretations relate to things that are personal to the viewer?

For example sports team colours?

Compare your results to David McCandless’ colour wheel. Do you see any differences or do your results correspond with his research

PERSONAL RESPONSES TO COLOUR An individual’s response to colours may be influenced by a number of factors.

How people see colours varies - what one person perceives as turquoise, another may see as green. Some people also have difficulty distinguishing between green and red (red-green colour blindness). How people describe colours is also subjective and depends on their personal vocabulary: person A may describe a hue as “dark pink” while person B might say it is “fuchsia”.

Visible spectrum the range of light that humans can see Wavelength the distance between waves of light that determines colour Hue the technical term for a colour Rods nerve cells in the eyeball that perceive black and white Cones nerve cells in the eyeball that perceive red, blue and green Optic nerve nerve that transmits light signals from the eyeball to the brain 13

Skills and methods Similarly, how people interpret different colours is complex and subjective, so person A and person B are unlikely to respond in the same way. The effect of using a particular colour is never certain, so it’s important for designers to have a sound understanding of colour theory so they can use it effectively to elicit the desired response in the majority of viewers/users.

EMOTIONAL RESPONSES TO COLOUR Many artists use colour to communicate emotions. A good example is the contrast between Picasso’s “blue period” paintings – considered to convey sadness and melancholy -- and his “rose period” painting generally associated with happiness. While this is an important aspect of visual communication, it is also important to understand how much of a dominant colour is used in a particular image and where.

Top Tip When thinking about colours and how they are used in a work or product, try to remember your initial response to the piece, your “gut feeling”. Usually this first automatic response is the one the majority of viewers will have and is the main one the designer was trying to evoke.

Case study: Reacting to colour

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Picasso used colour in his paintings to evoke an emotional response.

For example, try to imagine how different the image of the guitar player would be if Picasso had painted the guitar a bright yellow colour, or if the background wall was brilliant white. What would happen if the dominant colour palette in the rose period painting was changed to blue? Would the woman appear sadder, or would she seem the same?

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Part 2: Colour theory

Skills Task: Describing colours Show five friends or family members a selection of different coloured objects, or pictures of objects, and ask them to describe the colours used and why those colours were used.

1. Do they agree, or are there noticeable differences of opinion?

2. What cultural references do they use to describe the colours?

3. What subjective interpretations do people use when talking about the colours?

Compare your notes with other students. Does everyone have similar results?

If not, try to clarify why certain people made the associations they did.

Compare your results with David McCandless’ Colours in Culture diagram on page ???. Identify any areas where your research supports or challenges his research.

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The traditional model of colour, known as the “artist’s model”, is based on the three primary colours from which all other colours can be created –red, yellow and blue (RYB). However, designers use colour systems with different primary colours when using digital software, for example the RGB (red, green, blue) colour system discussed on page ??.

The Colour Wheel below shows how combinations of the RYB primary colours can be mixed to produce all the other colours. The secondary colours (orange, purple and green) are created by mixing two primary colours together in equal measure, and the tertiary colours (e.g. yellow orange, red purple, blue green) are created by mixing a primary colour with a secondary one in equal measure.

In design colour is described in three ways, by its name, by how pure it is, and by its value or lightness.The term designers use for a colour is hue. For example, although red, pink and terracotta are all reds, they are all different hues distinguished by their chroma, saturation, intensity and luminance. Chroma is the purity of a hue in relation to grey. Saturation is the amount of pure colour in a specific hue. Intensity refers to the brightness or dullness of a hue, while luminance is the amount of light reflected from a hue. We also talk about shades and tints when describing colour. A shade is a hue produced by adding black, a tint is one produced by adding white.

The following colour chart shows the variations of a single, highly saturated hue, the intense yellow colour to the far left (1). The next box shows a tint created by adding white (2), the next box shows a shade created by adding black (3), and the final box shows the same hue but with more chroma (grey) added (4). Notice how different these variations look and how the fourth variation doesn’t seem yellow at all.

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PRIMARY COLOURS

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7.2 CREATING COLOURS AND COMBINATIONS

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Fig 7.2 A colour wheel diagram created by Johannes Itten.

chroma the purity of a hue in relation to grey saturation the amount of pure colour in a specific hue intensity the brightness or dullness of a hue luminance the amount of light reflected from a hue shade a hue produced by adding black tint a hue produced by adding white 15

Skills and methods

COMBINING COLOURS

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The colour wheel shows how the primary and secondary colours relate, but also where tertiary colours fit into the model and how they relate to each other. For example, blue-reds are cooler than yellow-reds, red-purples appear hotter than blue-purples, yellow-greens are viewed as warm, while blue-greens are perceived as cooler.

Combining colours based on a sound knowledge of the colour wheel will give your design balance, harmony and structure. The colour schemes most often used in design practice are detailed below.

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Monochromatic schemes These are created by taking a single hue and adding black or white to create shades or tints.

Monochromatic schemes are harmonious and easy on the eye, but are weaker at highlighting areas of interest in a design.

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Analogous schemes These use colours adjacent to each other in the colour wheel. Analogous schemes are harmonious like monochromatic schemes, but have the added advantage of being effective in highlighting areas of interest.

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Complementary schemes These use pairs of colours that lie opposite each other in the colour wheel. They are good for highlighting and work best when one colour is more dominant than the other but the less dominant colour is the one used to accent certain features of the overall design.

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Split complementary schemes These are made up of three colours. The designer chooses a colour then selects two others from either side of its natural complementary colour. For example, if the base colour is yellow, the other two in the scheme would be mauve and indigo, the colours on either side of purple. These schemes create a lot of impact but are often difficult to balance.

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Triadic schemes These schemes use three colours equidistant from each other on the colour wheel, for example, red, blue and yellow. This approach enables the designer to create vibrant color harmonies, even with pale or unsaturated hues. To use a triadic harmony successfully, the colors should be carefully balanced. Ideally one colour would be dominant with the other for accent.

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Creating colour swatches A group of colours selected to work together on a particular project is called a colour swatch. Creating a colour swatch is an important part of the design process as it will influence many areas of the final product and how it is perceived. One way to create colour swatches is to use Johannes Itten’s 16

Part 2: Colour theory Colour Star which uses the Colour Wheel and templates to create colour combinations.

Another approach is to base the swatch on an existing image that makes good use of colour. Using one of the numerous online resources for creating colour swatches, you can create a colour combination automatically. The colour swatch below was created in this way using Adobe Photoshop.

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Industry insight Companies use colour in their branding to communicate with customers. Coca Cola’s red is an active colour while the orange used by Amazon gives the idea of innovation and being bold.

Companies will spend a lot of money on developing their colour schemes and on re-branding.

McDonalds changed from their iconic yellow and red to brown and greens in some of their stores to try and change how people felt about their restaurant.

Project work Make a colour swatch Choose an image you think uses colour effectively and follow the steps below to make your swatch.

• Import your image into the software programme (e.g. Photoshop).

• Use the colour selector to select the dominant colours from the image.

To do this use the eyedropper tool to click on an area of the image which has the colour you want. Your selected colour becomes the foreground colour.

• Save the colour in the colour palette. To do this click on the foreground colour and select “Add to swatches” from the dialogue box.

• Repeat the steps above for each colour.

• Create some abstract shapes and colour them using the colours from your palette.

Now answer the questions.

1. What happens when you change the size of one shape compared to the others?

2. What happens when you swap the colours of the different shapes?

3. Do some colours work better with some shapes than with others and if so why?

4. Which of these changes alter your emotional response to the colour combinations?

Ask your family and friends to comment on your ideas and record the answers. When you have some responses refer back to your initial image, you may be surprised at how different the responses were!

Further references Books Colour (Zelanski and Fisher, 2009) The Interaction of Colour (Albers, 2006) The Elements of Colour (Itten, 1970) The Colour Star (Itten, 1987) Websites https://www.colormatters.com/ http://library.si.edu/exhibition/ color-in-a-new-light/science

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