Color is a very broad topic. Entire books have been written on color
and it would be quite difficult to cover every aspect of it within the
confines of this article. My hopes with this introduction to 
color theory
is to peek your interest and hopefully cause you to study this topic
further on your own. Understanding color theory is perhaps one of the
most important aspects of becoming a good painter. When you understand
the elements of color and how colors interact with one another, you
have unlocked one of the biggest puzzles of painting.
WHERE DOES COLOR COME FROM?
Our beautiful world of color is only possible because of the solar
spectrum. You can certainly do your best to mimic natural sunlight with
today’s technology and they have done a pretty fine job of that with
full spectrum lighting. But even full spectrum lighting is not as true
as sunlight. One only needs to spend a day painting outdoors to see how
your color pops out at you under natural sunlight when compared to
indoor lighting.
So what exactly makes a rose appear “red” or grass appear “green”.
In the green grass, you are only seeing green because the grass has
pigments in it that absorb all colors of the solar spectrum except
green. So green is the color that is reflected back to your eyes. The
same holds true for the red rose, only the rose absorbs all colors of
the spectrum besides red.
THE COLOR WHEEL
Sir Issac Newton laid the foundation for today’s color wheel with
his experiments that began in 1666. Since then, many variations have
been developed. A color wheel is essentially a diagram that represents
the colors of the visible solar spectrum. Your basic color wheel
consists of six colors: red, orange, yellow, green, blue and violet.
Another popular color wheel called the Munsell color wheel, is
slightly more involved. Instead of 6 basic colors, the Munsell wheel
consists of ten colors: red, yellow-red, yellow, yellow-green, green,
blue-green, blue, blue-violet, red-violet and violet.
PRIMARY COLORS
The primary colors are red, yellow and blue. These colors are your base colors from which all other colors come from.
SECONDARY COLORS
When you mix two primary colors together, you get a secondary color.
The secondary colors are orange, green and violet. Orange is made by
mixing red with yellow. Green is made by mixing blue and yellow. Violet
is made my mixing blue with red.
TERTIARY COLORS
Tertiary colors are made by mixing one primary color with one
secondary color. For instance, mixing the primary color blue with the
secondary color green, will give you a tertiary color called blue-green.
COMPLIMENTARY COLORS
These are colors that are opposite from one another on the color
wheel. Red and green, blue and orange, yellow and violet, are examples
of complimentary colors. Complimentary colors are colors of extreme
contrast. When used together in a painting, they can produce brilliant
vibrant images.
ANALOGOUS COLORS
Analogous colors are colors that are close to one another on the
color wheel. They more or less will produce harmonious effects with
very little contrast. For instance, a violet, red-violet, and
blue-violet are examples of analogous colors.
HUE-VALUE-INTENSITY
Hue: Without getting too technical, and to put things into laymen’s
terms, hue is just another word for color. For instance, grass and
leaves are two variations of a green hue.
Value: Value refers to how light or dark a color is. Colors like
pink or aqua are identified as colors of high value. Colors like maroon
and navy are identified as colors of low value. If you produce a
painting with predominately higher values, the painting is referred to
as a “high key” painting. On the contrary, paintings produced with
predominately lower values, are referred to as “low key”.
Intensity: Intensity refers to a colors brightness or saturation.
Intensity refers to how pure a color is. For instance, if you were to
use cadmium red straight from the tube, it would have a high intensity.
If you were to mix it with another color however, its intensity would
be diminished.
TEMPERATURE OF COLOR
Colors have temperature, referred to as warm or cool. In painting,
reds, yellows and oranges are referred to as warm colors and blues,
violets and greens are referred to as cool colors. One of the biggest
lessons you will ever learn about color temperature though, is that the
appearance of color can change drastically depending on its
surroundings. For instance, a certain yellow would appear much hotter
if it were surrounded by a violet then say an orange. Another important
lesson in color temperature: Warm colors will advance in a painting and
cool colors recede.
I hope you enjoyed this post. Check out my blog for more online art instruction for beginners
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