Home Forums The Learning Center Color Theory and Mixing Color wheels – what am I not getting

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  • #994209
    Barbareola
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        Hello!

        On my quest to better understand color theory and mixing, I have read a lot of books catering from beginners to more advanced students, watched online videos and so forth. I have found that a lot of writers praise color wheels: how important it is to know them, to own them and that every artist should make at least one of them. And I feel… somewhat underimpressed, I guess.

        From what I understand, a colour wheel is a representation that sorts colors in a wheel and matches complementary colors opposite to each other, for example green opposite to red. It is also used to demonstrate primary, secondary and tertiary colors and how they relate to each other.

        So far, so good. But how many times does somebody really need to look at that thing to look up the complementary color of red or yellow? Even if you are a slow learner, you’re bound to learn it, eventually. Plus, there are hues that are not on the conventional color wheels like browns or pinks.

        So: what I am not getting? Is this all there is to color wheels? If so, I find their usefulness somewhat… hyped, for a lack of a better word.
        Or *is* there another dimension, another use that I don’t see?

        Looking forward to your responses.

        #1253572
        Mythrill
        Default

            Hello!

            On my quest to better understand color theory and mixing, I have read a lot of books catering from beginners to more advanced students, watched online videos and so forth. I have found that a lot of writers praise color wheels: how important it is to know them, to own them and that every artist should make at least one of them. And I feel… somewhat underimpressed, I guess.

            From what I understand, a colour wheel is a representation that sorts colors in a wheel and matches complementary colors opposite to each other, for example green opposite to red. It is also used to demonstrate primary, secondary and tertiary colors and how they relate to each other.

            So far, so good. But how many times does somebody really need to look at that thing to look up the complementary color of red or yellow? Even if you are a slow learner, you’re bound to learn it, eventually. Plus, there are hues that are not on the conventional color wheels like browns or pinks.

            So: what I am not getting? Is this all there is to color wheels? If so, I find their usefulness somewhat… hyped, for a lack of a better word.
            Or *is* there another dimension, another use that I don’t see?

            Looking forward to your responses.

            The color wheel is an intuitive but outdated system. The problem is that different pigments may not mix as you expect. For example: most times, mixing green with violet will give you a color that’s either neutral or close to neutral. But if you mix Dioxazine Violet, Blue Shade (PV 23) with Phthalo Green, Blue Shade (PG 7) you should get a steel blue instead. This is not predicted by the color wheel, and shouldn’t ever be possible.

            And this is not the only exception, of course: mix Cobalt Teal Blue (PG 50) with Lemon Yellow (PY 3). You’ll get an extremely bright, almost neon green, even though Cobalt Teal Blue is naturally whitened – and to add insult to the injury, it lightens and neutralizes almost every other mix!

            If you want to learn how colors mix more accurately, then you’re probably better off with a split primary palette or the Munsell system. They’ll help you a lot, even though they’re a bit harder to figure out.

            #1253617
            DaveAndrews
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                Colour wheels, limited perhaps, but use this an opportunity to develop your ‘muscle memory’. Think about how much can be pulled from the colour wheel. At school we took an image, maybe a tree or flower, and painted a picture in just two colours from the colour wheel. Usually this is red and green (opposite each other on the wheel). Simple yes, but it does work and a powerful effect is achieved. At art school we were given a simple project to choose just two colours, the brief was to do as much as possible with those two colours. The limitation made us all the more creative. Crawl before you walk and walk before you run.

                #1253559
                WFMartin
                Default

                    Hello!

                    On my quest to better understand color theory and mixing, I have read a lot of books catering from beginners to more advanced students, watched online videos and so forth. I have found that a lot of writers praise color wheels: how important it is to know them, to own them and that every artist should make at least one of them. And I feel… somewhat underimpressed, I guess.

                    Well, as a tool, a properly made color wheel is profoundly more useful than a “mixing chart”. However, one cannot create an accurate color wheel without the use of a scientific color analyzing instrument. One cannot merely “plop” colors down intuitively, without having a scientific basis for doing so. Well….one CAN, I suppose, but it won’t be accurate.

                    From what I understand, a colour wheel is a representation that sorts colors in a wheel and matches complementary colors opposite to each other, for example green opposite to red.

                    Well, on a scientific color wheel, Magenta is opposite Green. (Magenta is a primary color.) Yes, on a properly-created color wheel, complementary colors do occur directly opposite each other, and they do mix to create neutral.

                    Blue is the complement to the primary, Yellow.

                    Red is the complement to the primary, Cyan

                    It is also used to demonstrate primary, secondary and tertiary colors and how they relate to each other.

                    That’s true.

                    So far, so good. But how many times does somebody really need to look at that thing to look up the complementary color of red or yellow? Even if you are a slow learner, you’re bound to learn it, eventually. Plus, there are hues that are not on the conventional color wheels like browns or pinks.

                    Well, a scientific plot of colors on a color wheel helps you understand the general hue bias, or tendency of particular colors. But, as one who has taught color theory, and application at the college level for several years, you are correct, …….after not too long a time, one begins to commit most of the basics to memory. No one needs to tell me that Quinacridone Red contributes more Yellow to a mixture than Permanent Rose. Once I plotted it on a color wheel, I merely remember it.

                    Browns are grayed versions of Red, and will plot as such on a color wheel as a lower-chroma version of red (closer to the center of the wheel). However, “pink” is a lighter version of Red, and that can only be represented in the third dimension of the color wheel–that of VALUE. Value (light, and dark) cannot be represented on a two-dimensional color wheel.

                    So: what I am not getting?

                    Well, if you draw a line between any two colors on a scientifically-created color wheel, you will roughly have represented all the possible colors that occur BETWEEN the two colors. Predicting mixed colors is nothing to be sneezed at in terms of usefulness. THAT is what makes it a “tool”, rather than something to hang on your studio wall, as a testament that you ARE an artist.:lol:

                    Is this all there is to color wheels?

                    I often use it to indicate where a new color with which I may not be familiar, plots in relation to other colors. I also use it to determine the overtone of a given color. When White is added to Cadmium Orange, it begins to become “redder”, as it lightens. THAT is something that can be easily demonstrated with a successive reading of that color, as progressive amounts of White is mixed with it.

                    I once tested Primary Yellow, to see how “green” it became as Black was added to it. Well, it did, although not as “Green” as I had expected it to become.

                    If so, I find their usefulness somewhat… hyped, for a lack of a better word.
                    Or *is* there another dimension, another use that I don’t see?

                    Looking forward to your responses.

                    I used to contend that Those who purchased Cobalt Blue were spending a great deal of money to own a color that could be nearly duplicated by just adding White to Ultramarine Blue. After a plot or two on the color wheel, I proved that to be very true.

                    Here is a color wheel with several interesting colors plotted on it……Not by guessing, but by taking color readings on a color-measuring instrument.

                    Draw a line between any two colors, and you will have a rough approximation of the colors that are likely to occur between the two. See what I mean about expensive, Cobalt Blue, and Ultramarine Blue being nearly the same?? Notice how Primary Yellow becomes Green, as Black is mixed with it? See the differences between all the “Reds” that I’ve plotted? Which one more likely would mix with Blue to create a clean Violet, or “purple”? (Hope you said, “Thalo Red Rose”!:lol:

                    These are the things for which I use a color wheel. But, ya’ can’t do it by GUESSING where the colors plot–ya’ definitely need a color instrument.

                    After over 40 years of dealing with color in the litho trade, teaching it a the college level, and painting with all sorts of mediums, I pretty much carry the placements of plotted colors around in my head. No one needs to tell me that Dioxazine Purple actually represents a much better version of true, scientific “Blue”, and that it is closer to being the complement to Yellow, than all the other “Blues” that are on that color wheel. :lol:

                    Here are a couple of simple facts: Fact 1) Most store-bought color wheels don’t even have two of the primary colors represented on them. Those colors are Cyan (best found in Thalo Blue …PB15), and Magenta (best found in Grumbacher’s Thalo Red Rose…..PV19). Squeeze those paints out on your palette sometime, add a bit of white to each, and try to find them on a store-bought color wheel. Ya’ can’t, usually. How good a tool can those color wheels be?

                    Fact 2) In order to “make your own color wheel”, you MUST have access to a color measuring instrument. It cannot be done with guesswork.

                    wfmartin. My Blog "Creative Realism"...
                    https://williamfmartin.blogspot.com

                    #1253600
                    opainter
                    Default

                        The color wheel correctly represents how us humans imagine that red, on the low-frequency end of the visible color spectrum, seamlessly crosses over into violet, which is (counterintuitively enough) on the high-frequency end of the visible color spectrum. That’s kind of cool! Apart from that feature, the color wheel is just one of many possible three-dimensional projections onto a two-dimensional surface. And what is that useful for? Arguing about color, of course! :lol:

                        AJ (opainter), C&C always welcome
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                        #1253560
                        WFMartin
                        Default

                            The color wheel correctly represents how us humans imagine that red, on the low-frequency end of the visible color spectrum, seamlessly crosses over into violet, which is (counterintuitively enough) on the high-frequency end of the visible color spectrum. That’s kind of cool! Apart from that feature, the color wheel is just one of many possible three-dimensional projections onto a two-dimensional surface. And what is that useful for? Arguing about color, of course! :lol:

                            Hey……We do a LOT of that, don’t we? :lol: :lol: :lol:

                            Understand what the true, primary colors are, ……..how they behave by themselves, and when mixed with other colors, and you’ve pretty much got the “color world” by the tail, actually. The color wheel helps you to do that.

                            wfmartin. My Blog "Creative Realism"...
                            https://williamfmartin.blogspot.com

                            #1253603
                            KolinskyRed
                            Default

                                Here’s a perceptually uniform colour wheel, specifically, the hue/chroma plane. On this plane the masstones of paints in a paint set have been plotted. Masstone is equivalent to the paint right out of the tube, just thick enough to mask the white of the support almost completely. Of course, a lot of these paints (not all) will shift in hue when pulled/scrapped/diluted into thinfilm so that we can see the white of the support showing through, or if mixed with white.

                                Taking the example cited above in a previous post, the red stars represent the mixing of two paints. Here, the arrangement does give a reasonable prediction of how the paints will mix, as Bill points out.

                                Phthalo Green bs and Dioxizine Purple bs in the first example.
                                Lemon Yellow and Cobalt Teal Blue in the second example.

                                So, organizing the tubes around a perceptually uniform hue/chroma plane is a very helpful step. Value is shown as a number beside each paint name, I’m not expecting anyone to be able to read the labels on this graphic though, it’s just for illustrating the two mixing pairs mentioned.

                                Having this layout on a perceptually uniform “wheel” and knowing which paints are strongly tinting and which are not is very helpful. There is a systematic way to determine the relative Tinting Strength of your paints if your manufacturer isn’t listing this attribute. Happy to share this simple technique, if there’s interest. The technique involves some simple paint outs.

                                Overall, some folks would enjoy such explorations, and some folks may not ~ but to each their own in the enjoyment of painting. :)

                                Cheers!

                                #1253573
                                Mythrill
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                                    Kollinsky, you just want to correct something there: you’ll have a bright green in the second chart not because of tinting strength, but of saturation. Tinting strength is how large an area a pigment can cover.

                                    #1253604
                                    KolinskyRed
                                    Default

                                        Hi MyThrill,

                                        I couldn’t find your paints and made some guesses, can you share the manufactuers name for Cobalt Teal Blue and Lemon Yellow?

                                        If you’re saying saturation as in how far outward from the centre the masstones plot, then it would be interesting to see where the actual paints sit. Possibly the “greenish-blue” might sit further out as an end point. An extremely bright, neon green to me suggests reaching the “outer limits of the chroma rim” as I like to call it, and in the GY to YG region, that is very colourful indeed! By high tinting strength, just strong ~ not the strongest which are paints with extraordinary mixing capabilities indeed. But you are right ~ it depends on the paint, I await the answer. I’m thinking that to reach such a vivid mix, this characteristic would be at play, I’m guessing. I await the identity of the paints :)

                                        I do agree that a big ballyhoo is made in a painting classes “here is the wheel”… well, then we’re on to something else. I was left feeling, what was the point of that? I really anticipated some great reveal. And I do agree that there are design and/or re-production problems with digital/printed wheels about what they symbolize, IMO, and as Bill often mentions. But, I had prior knowledge of such things through my work and decided to enjoy making a game/puzzle out of it. It is quite interesting and thoroughly enjoyable.

                                        I do think at the very least a beginner could be guided to lay out their tubes around a wheel, and explore initial mixing in this way to reinforce the relationships of mixing, and saturation costs etc. I think at every step it should be about the paints, for sure.

                                        Cheers!

                                        #1253586
                                        Anonymous

                                            Color does not exist within the constraints and confines of the form of a circle. There is no circular pattern found in nature for colors, but there are linear forms.
                                            Color wheels are entirely man made creations, constructed at the whim of whoever is arranging the wheel to their particular preference and liking.
                                            But they do give people something to argue about and claim that theirs is the “correct” version.

                                            #1253561
                                            WFMartin
                                            Default

                                                The only way to graphically explain the existence of the primary color, Magenta, is with a color wheel. The primary color, Magenta, is composed of equal reflectance of both the Blue, and the Red portions of the natural spectrum. And, since those two color occur at the opposite ends of a cross-section of the natural spectrum, a color wheel is the only way to graphically display that color.

                                                The natural, linear, spectrum may be nice to think about, but sorry to say, the primary color, Magenta does not even exist within it.

                                                Because a color wheel is “man-made” does not make it any less credible in terms of logical usefulness; plus, it easily explains the existence of the primary color, Magenta.:)

                                                wfmartin. My Blog "Creative Realism"...
                                                https://williamfmartin.blogspot.com

                                                #1253574
                                                Mythrill
                                                Default

                                                    Hi MyThrill,

                                                    I couldn’t find your paints and made some guesses, can you share the manufactuers name for Cobalt Teal Blue and Lemon Yellow?

                                                    The versions I had were Cobalt Turquoise Light (PG 50) from Winsor & Newton, which is slightly bluer, and Cobalt Teal Blue (PG 50), from Daniel Smith, which is slighly greener. Lemon Yellow (PY 3) was from Corfix, a national brand. I think any Lemon Yellow will do.

                                                    I’m thinking that to reach such a vivid mix, this characteristic would be at play, I’m guessing. I await the identity of the paints :)

                                                    The funny thing is, Cobalt Teal Blue (PG 50) doesn’t seem saturated. At all. And it also has that naturally and slightly whitish look. It only makes bright greens with Lemon Yellow (PY 3), and possibly with any other yellows around this color space. Which is atypical.

                                                    I do think at the very least a beginner could be guided to lay out their tubes around a wheel, and explore initial mixing in this way to reinforce the relationships of mixing, and saturation costs etc. I think at every step it should be about the paints, for sure.

                                                    Mixing colors yourself and making your own chart would certainly be the best approach, if you can do that.

                                                    #1253587
                                                    Anonymous

                                                        Color wheels satisfy man’s desire for symmetry.

                                                        #1253605
                                                        KolinskyRed
                                                        Default

                                                            The versions I had were Cobalt Turquoise Light (PG 50) from Winsor & Newton, which is slightly bluer, and Cobalt Teal Blue (PG 50), from Daniel Smith, which is slighly greener. Lemon Yellow (PY 3) was from Corfix, a national brand. I think any Lemon Yellow will do.

                                                            A Cobalt Turquoise light, mid tone, high chroma (for that colour family, can’t get much more colourful) ~ yes, this swings the angle around closer to the yellow. And the Lemon Yellow, very colourful (high chroma) and very light valued. Thanks for sharing!

                                                            #1253575
                                                            Mythrill
                                                            Default

                                                                Color wheels satisfy man’s desire for symmetry.

                                                                I think you have a point there, Sid.

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