Color Theory for Illustrators

 

Color Theory and Tools for Color Palettes

Are you struggling with the colors in your illustrations?
I really was a time ago.
For a long time I was using colors just appealing to my taste, producing works with different grades of quality, but with no real guides to follow.
Fear not! There are guides and simple rules to keep you in the good path to produce mesmerizing pieces of art.
Here are my favorite tutorials I found on the internet to introduce you in the amazing world of colors. All of them are oriented to digital painting, but you can use the theory for the traditional media too.


1.- Color theory for designers — a crash course (with infographic)

By Micah Bowers  http://www.designmicah.com

https://uxdesign.cc/color-theory-for-designers-a-crash-course-with-infographic-41d8b4c45619

2.- Simona Ceccarelli tutorials:

@smceccarelli on Twitter

Color for Illustration part 1: All you need to know about color theory
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=82NahznF1H0

Color for Illustration part 2: Forget theory, keep calm and do color studies
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZHbAGFbEwsM

3.- Ahmed Aldoori's Basic Color tutorial:

@ahmedaldoori on Twitter.

I watched this tutorial several times, because is very practical. He also includes some free Photoshop brushes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yh12RA3ha0U

 4.- Jon Neimeister tutorial on Skin Tones:

@Andantonius on Twitter
Includes the Psd to download.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PPdkEEYo3F0

5.- Paintable: Color Thumbnails: How to Pick Better Colors (Fast!)

@PaintableCC on Twitter

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=taS8rwZSEXo&feature=youtu.be

6.- Colors in Goethe

Maria Popova @brainpicker on Twitter.

This is an interesting article published at BrainPickings about Goethe's Color Theory.

https://www.brainpickings.org/2012/08/17/goethe-theory-of-colours/


7.- Tools:

Adobe Color:
https://color.adobe.com/create

Color Hunt - Color Palettes:
https://colorhunt.co/

Grabient - Gradients
https://www.grabient.com/

Color Palette Generator
http://www.cssdrive.com/imagepalette/

Color Explorer
http://www.colorexplorer.com

Color Space
https://mycolor.space/

Coolors
https://coolors.co/

Color Hex
https://www.color-hex.com/color-palettes/

Paletton
http://paletton.com

Canva
https://www.canva.com/colors/color-palette-generator/

Material Design
https://material.io/tools/color/#!/?view.left=0&view.right=0

Color Mind
http://colormind.io/

Khroma
http://khroma.co/

Color Box
http://www.colorbox.io/

Colours Cafe
https://www.instagram.com/colours.cafe/?hl=en

Colour Code (Now at Toptotal)
https://www.toptal.com/designers/colourcode

Cloudflare Design Color
https://cloudflare.design/color/

Colors & fonts
A Curated group of color gradients, palettes and font pairings for designers and developers by @Mike_Andreuzza
https://www.colorsandfonts.com/

I hope this will be helpful.

Behind the Scenes

Font in use: Alternate Gothic No 2 by Linotype