Choosing colors for your website
I’ve decided to start a miniature series on an area of website design which has always given me bother - choosing the right colors. However these days, picking a good color palette shouldn’t be difficult. There’s tonnes of software out there to help you, and many helpful communities who have already done all of the work for you.
When I was doing a little research for this series there were tonnes of articles on color theory, but I’ve decided that my series isn’t going to include one. Color theory is almost a science, and as a result, tonnes of tools have been developed to help you choose the right colors. Therefore, I think that the theory isn’t as important as it once was.
There are many color scheme generators out there. One of my favourite tools is a tool called ColorSchemer Studio. It’s a feature-packed application which helps you create color schemes easily. In addition, Color SchemerStudio comes with a “built-in” community, where you can download other peoples’ color schemes, and manipulate them using the program.
There are numerous color scheme generators out there. Other generators include a more basic online version of ColorSchemer Studio, and Color Scheme Generator 2. I was a big fan of the latter application before I downloaded Color Schemer Studio.
I’m not going to explain how to use them, because they’re simple to use. Choose a base color, select a few options, and away you go.
Another good idea is to create a color scheme based on an image. For example, if an image is going to be one of the main parts of your website, you can create a color scheme based on it.
The last option is for those who can’t even be bothered to use software to create a palette. There are a huge number of community-based sites out there, where users upload color schemes they’ve created. You can then use their color schemes in your own website. One of the most popular is COLORlovers. COLORlovers is a true community orientated site, and as such, there are many useful features, like the voting system, to help make choosing a palette easy.
There’s no doubt that color scheme generators, and “color” communities have made getting the right colors for websites easy. Color is a very important facet of a website, and so you should take the time to put together a good color scheme. There are no excuses for using the wrong colors.
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5 Responses to “Choosing colors for your website”
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[...] started a short series on choosing colors for your website, and I’m going to continue with that series into July. I plan on showing some examples of [...]
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July 2nd, 2008
[...] on Digg.com’s base color. However, after trying out different base colors and settings in Color Schemer Studio, I decided that dark blue was their base [...]
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July 5th, 2008
Kuler?
Mr Mat
July 8th, 2008
[...] talked about tools to help you create color schemes for your website, but what colors should you actually choose? To use a color scheme generator [...]