Every artist needs to find a color scheme that works for them. It is easy to immediately jump into choosing a favorite color and going with it, but you can create better art by taking the time to do things properly. This article will help you do just that!
Color Theory Basics
The first place to start is always theory because if you don’t know how colors interact with each other, you will have a much harder time trying to plan out your picture. You need to understand how color perception works, and there are tons of resources available on the Internet that can help.
Let’s explore the way that a color scheme is created by considering the four main color scheme categories.
The Four Main Categories of Color Schemes
There are four main categories for color schemes: monochromatic, analogous, complementary, and split-complementary.
Monochromatic colors all come from the same base hue. For example, if you used yellow as your base color, then a monochronic color scheme would consist of different shades and tints of only that one color.
Analogous colors are similar to each other on the wheel. They might be close neighbors, or they might be far away.
Complementary colors are opposite each other on the color wheel, such as red and green.
Split complementary is a mix of two adjacent colors on the color wheel (yellow-orange or blue-purple). If you split up (separate) one of those colors slightly into its component hues, you will get the second type of split complementary color scheme.
How to Use the Four Categories of Color Schemes
In order to start developing a scheme, you need to pick a base color. The next step is to select one of the four categories and then use that as your secondary color.
Once you have done that, you can choose another category for your tertiary color, etc. If you want an even more complex scheme, feel free to branch out into using tints/shades and monochrome colors.
With these tips, you’ll be on your way to creating a color scheme that you can use for your art.