Tuesday, March 18, 2008

Colour

Here you'll find all things colour-related, including information on colour theory and standards, links to online colour pickers and tools, as well as links to monitor calibration software and hardware resources.

Monitor calibration and colour management:


Basic monitor calibration:
Monitor calibration grayscale
You should be able to see each step in this greyscale separated, and the background should be neutral grey.If you're using a TFT display with default settings, it is likely that you have to reduce the contrast of your display to see all tones. Many displays have the contrast set very high to make them stand out from the rest in the shops.

Cambridge in Colour – Colour management tutorial
Sean T. McHugh has posted one of the best tutorials I've seen on the theory and practice of colour management on his photograhpy website Cambridge in Colour.

colourconfidence.com
A range of colour calibration tools and colour management related hardware and software available for purchase.

Pantone.com
Eye-One and Huey monitor calibration hardware.

ColorVision
Manufacturer of calibration and colour workflow hardware and software.


Colour tools:


kuler.adobe.com
Browse, create, share and download colour schemes with this free online tool from Adobe Labs.Comprehensive colour references [HSV, RGB, CMYK, LAB and HEX] makes this a useful tool for print as well as screen design. Colour schemes can be downloaded for integration with Adobe Creative Suite.

colorblender.com
Online tool for developing colour schemes with RGB and HEX colour references. Basic but effective interface, including functions for sharing or downloading your colours.

www.wellstyled.com/tools/colorscheme2
Colour-wheel based colour generator with a clever drop-down menu that lets you test what your colour schemes look like for people with 8 different types of colour blindness.

DeXign Pantone Color chart
A very handy online colour chart from deXign that provides colour swatches and the closest RGB and HEX equivalent for the full range of Pantone colours.


Colour resources:


colorschemer.com
Popular and feature-rich application for developing colour shemes. Also features online galleries, colour forums and a blog.

colourmod.com
DHTML Dynamic Colour Picker and Dashboard Widget

linxexplorer.com/colorpicker
Visual Color Picker is a free Windows application that lets you to capture the color value from any position of the screen and translate it into RGB, HSV, CMYK and HEX values.

www.visibone.com
Colour reference charts online and as hard copies.

www.colourlovers.com
Online-community-style colour site featuring galleries, forums, articles and job-shop


Colour standards:


www.color.org
The site of the International Color Consortium, the organisation responsible for defining the ICC colour profile standard and for setting international standards for colour management.

pantone.com
The company behind the internationally used Pantone colour matching system.


Colour theory:


www.worqx.com/color
One of the most comprehensive online resources for colour theory and advice.

Wikipedia Color theory
A good primer in colour theory from Wikipedia

www.colormatters.com
A range of colour related information, resources and links.

Causes of Color
An interesting and unusual site that looks at the characteristics, effects and significance of colour.

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