Color Theory

Triad Colors

A triadic color scheme uses colors that are evenly spaced around the color wheel.

Primary Colors

Any of a group of colors from which all other colors can be obtained by mixing. Red, Yellow, Blue

Greyscale

Black and white only

Hue

Color

Complementary Colors

Colors directly opposite each other in the color spectrum, such as red and green or blue and orange, that when combined in the right proportions, produce white light.

CYMK

Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, and Black Print process model

Secondary Colors

Green, Purple, Orange A color resulting from the mixing of two primary colors.

Analogous Colors

Groups of three colors that are next to each other on the color wheel, with one being the dominant color, which tends to be a primary or secondary color, and a tertiary. Red, orange, and red-orange are examples.

Saturation

How much color

RGB

Light generated model Red, green, blue

RGY

Pigment generated model Red, Green, yellow

Tertiary Colors

Red-purple, red-orange, yellow-orange, yellow-green, blue-green, blue-purple Tertiary colors are the resulting color formed when an equal amount of a primary and a secondary color are mixed. The primary and secondary color must be beside each other on the color wheel. For example, a mixture of 50-percent red and 50-percent magenta would result in the tertiary color of orange.

Split Complementary Colors

The split-complementary color scheme is a variation of the complementary color scheme. In addition to the base color, it uses the two colors adjacent to its complement. This color scheme has the same strong visual contrast as the complementary color scheme, but has less tension.

Tetradic Colors

The tetradic (double complementary) colors scheme is the richest of all the schemes because it uses four colors arranged into two complementary color pairs.

Black

Tint and shade

Quadrilateral Colors

Working with a Rectangular Tetrad means juggling four colors. Simply put, you're choosing a rectangle of four colors on the basic color wheel. That means you are always working with two pairs of Complementary Colors.