Color Theory

In the past, I’ve picked the colors for my scrapbook pages based on what I like. My choices had no rhyme or reason; they just needed to be a color that appealed to me. This made for some very bland pages- a lot of bland pages. All of my pages looked the same, and nothing stood out about them.

This was the inspiration for our first experiment. Can we improve the quality of our pages by applying color theory when selecting design element colors?

I did a Bing search for color theory in digital scrapbooking, which returned 677,000 results. If you want to dig deep into the subject, there is A LOT of information available. I picked a few articles and a few videos. They were all very interesting and consistent with the information they provided. Check them out if you have time. I’ve only skimmed the surface of the knowledge they put out there.

• Scrapgirls.com – Color Inspiration for Digital Scrapbooking Layouts
• Scraplifters.com – How to Select Colors for Scrapbook Layouts
• Canva.com – Color Theory and the Color Wheel
• Marisa Lerin@Digital Scrapbook.com – Using Color Theory to Create Harmonious Digital Scrapbook Pages
• TheDigitalPress.co – Tips for Choosing Color Schemes
• Flow Studio – Color Theory for Noobs | Beginner Guide
• Close to My Heart – Use Color Theory to Help Scrapbook Your Memories
• Sarah Renae Clark – Color Theory Basics: Use the Color Wheel & Color Harmonies to Choose Colors that Work Well Together
• Brad’s Art School – Color Theory – A Beginners Guide
• Let’s Draw with BeeJayDel – Color Theory for Digital Artists & Beginners
• Art by Annabelle – How to Choose Cohesive Colours for Your Artwork | Colour Theory + Colour Palette Tips

The Color Wheel

The foundation of color theory is the color wheel, which consists of 12 hues. From those hues, all other colors are created.

There are many different adaptations of the color wheel. The article at Canva.com best described the 2 most popular color wheels.

The RYB or red, yellow, blue color wheel is typically used by artists, as it helps with combining paint
colors. Then there is the RGB, or red, green and blue color wheel, which is designed for online use, as it refers to mixing light – like on a computer or TV screen.

From: Canva.com

You can use either color wheel (RYB or RGB) to draw inspiration. When you choose the color picker, the wheel you see in your scrapbooking applications will be an RGB color wheel.

The 12 hues on the RGB wheel are broken down as:

• Primary Colors
  • Red
  • Green
  • Blue
• Secondary Colors (These are made by mixing the primary colors)
  • Cyan (Green + Blue)
  • Magenta (Blue + Red)
  • Yellow (Red + Green)
• Tertiary Colors (These are made by mixing a primary color with a secondary color)
  • Yellow-Green (Yellow + Green)
  • Blue-Green (Green + Blue)
  • Blue-Violet (Blue + Magenta)
  • Red-Violet (Magenta + Red)
  • Red-Orange (Red + Yellow)
  • Yellow-Orange (Yellow + Red)

Expanding the Color Wheel

If you pick one of the colors from the outer ring of the color circle, you can adjust the saturation and brightness to create a wide variety of colors.

Saturation controls the intensity of the color. The lower the value, the more desaturated and gray the color looks. The higher the value, the more intense the color. Use intense colors sparingly. They attract the eye and can detract from your photos.

Brightness controls how much white and black are in the color. The shades of the color are found towards the lowest values (more black). The tones of the color are located towards the middle of the scale (more gray). The tints of the color are found towards the highest values (more white).

The picture below shows what happens to the color blue as you increase and decrease the saturation and brightness values.

Color Schemes aka Color Harmonies

Colors can be grouped to create a visually appealing layout that enhances your photographs. The article I read by Sarah Renae Clark described the 6 most common groupings of color.

We can use our 12 basic hues on the color wheel along with some easy-to-use formulas to create an endless collection of color combinations that look balanced, appealing, and just ‘work’.

Monochromatic: 1 of the 12 main colors is selected, then variations of shades, tones, or tints are used to create the monochromatic theme

Complementary: 2 colors from the opposite side of the color wheel, creates strong contrast in your image

Split-Complementary: Same as complementary but one of the colors is split into 2 nearby colors, keeps the strong contrast but adds more variety

Triadic: Uses 3 colors that are evenly spaced around the color wheel like a triangle, bold and vibrant

Tetradic: Uses 4 colors in a rectangular shape made up of 2 sets of complementary colors, focus on one main color and use the other colors to set up contrast

Analogous: 2 to 4 colors that are next to each other on the color wheel, works best if you choose one main color and use the other colors for accents

From: Sarah Renae Clark

Picking a Palette for your Layout

There are many ways to begin your journey towards your perfect palette.

* Browse through Pinterest for inspiration.  
* Check out different advertisements to see how they use color. 
* Look around you to see what color combinations you find appealing. 
* Examine the pictures you want to place in your layout. 
    * Are there colors in the picture that you want to use in your elements? 
    * Is there a specific mood you want to express with your design?

Expressing Moods with Color

Colors have been known to evoke emotion.

• Red: Passion, Fire, Love, Danger, Violence
• Orange: Energy, Creativity, Autumn, Movement, Warmth, Enthusiasm
• Yellow: Joy, Optimism, Fresh, Active, Happiness, Cheerfulness
• Green: Healing, Nature, Growth, Safety, Balance
• Blue: Wisdom, Serenity, Calmness, Sadness, Trust, Confidence
• Purple: Wealth, Ambition, Prestige, Imagination, Romance, Royal, Luxury
• Black: Rebellion, Power, Elegance, Death
• White: Purity, Virtue, Peace

If you want to convey a specific mood with your scrapbook page, consider making the color associated with that mood your primary color.

Color Temperature Can Also Convey a Mood

Red, orange, and yellow are considered warm colors. These colors are considered energetic and exciting. You can make any color a warm color by adding yellow to it.

Blue, green, and purple are considered cool colors. These colors are considered calm and relaxing. You can make any color a cool color by adding blue to it.

Picking the Color from Your Pictures

I’ve chosen the pictures above for my layout. My grandson spent five days in the hospital in 2022, and I still haven’t put it in the scrapbook.

I’ve decided to create my palette using the colors from my pictures as the inspiration. I am going to start by importing my collage of images into Adobe Color.

The link above opens up to this page:

Click on the ‘Extract Theme’ link:

You can drag and drop your photo onto the page or click ‘Select a file’ to locate the file on your computer.

Adobe will scan the picture as it opens it. It creates several palettes based on the colors in the image. It uses the color schemes/harmonies to create different moods. You can look through the various options it provides.

Colorful:

Bright:

Muted:

Deep:

Dark:

None: I used this to create my own palette

Note: For all the moods, you can click and drag the color circle in the picture and move it to another color.

I thought the muted color palette fit the mood of the hospital setting the best. But I still want to look at the other color schemes.

Playing with the Color Schemes

I set my theme back to ‘Muted’ and clicked on the ‘Color Wheel’ link:

Before playing with the different color schemes, you have to decide which color will be your base color. To do this, hover over the color you want and click on the triangle at the bottom of the color chip. I picked the tan for my base color.

Now start scrolling through the color schemes:
Analogous:

Monochromatic:

Triadic:

Complementary:

Split-Complementary:

Tetradic:

The last 2 options weren’t directly covered in the articles and videos, but they are choices in Adobe Color.
Compound:

Shades:

Saving Your Palette

Once you’ve picked the color palette you want, you need to save it so we can use it to create our page elements. If your scrapbooking program doesn’t use Adobe Swatch Exchange (ASE) files. Click on the download icon to save a JPEG version of your palette to your computer. This can be loaded into your scrapbooking program, and the colors can be picked using the eyedropper tool in your application.

If your scrapbooking program can use ASE files, save your palette. Make sure the scheme you want is selected. Give it a name, and then press the ‘Save’ button.

Now click on the ‘Libraries’ link at the top of the page to retrieve your saved file.

Open the folder to see your file. Mine is in the ‘My Recent’ folder. Yours may be under a different folder.

Single-click on your palette to open it.

There are many options on this page. Right now, we are only interested in the ‘Download as ASE’ link. Clicking on that will save a copy of the ASE file on your computer. You can load this ASE file into Photoshop Elements and easily use the palette in your layout design.