OUGD404: 7 Colour Contrasts

Colour Contrasts

Today we were introduced to the seven colour contrasts used in colour theory. Despite the contrasts being seven individual contrasts they exist to work together and build upon each other and wouldn't stand alone. Contrast of tone determines how light or dark something is, Hue determines the colour, saturation determines how bright that colour is etc. Without the previously set contrasts in place the next one couldn't function (e.g. you can't have saturation of colour without colour) and so when it comes to contrasts in colour, there is always more than one and often grouped under simultaneous contrast.

Contrast of Tone: How light or dark something is, works in monochrome. 

Contrast of Hue: What colour something is/where it is on the colour wheel

Contrast of Saturation: How vibrant/bright the colour is 

Contrast of Extension: The proportion of one colour to another

Contrast of Temperature: Hot and cold colours

Complimentary Contrast: Contrasts colours/colour wheel opposites

Simultaneous Contrast: Multiple Contrasts happening at once.

TASK

Taking what we now know about colour contrasts we would compare a coloured item and how it's contrasts changed when introduced to another colour/s. 

Green Paper

Due to red and green being opposites on the colour wheel it's clear that a complimentary contrast was occurring, due to the extreme difference in colour we can also say there's a contrast go hue. The red also brings out a bluish tint to the green where as the green transforms the red into looking 'pinker'. Due to green being considered a cold colour and red a hot one, we could also argue there is a contrast of temperature.

Orange and green are still rather opposite on the colour wheel, but not directly, this creates a contrast of extension, as well as a contrast of temperature (orange=warm, green=cool). The orange, like with the red manages to draw out a blue tinge from the green scarp of paper. We could also argue with all these contrasts that a contrast of extension is present for all, proportionately the green is always lesser than it's background colour.

Green on yellow seems to be the only colour that make's the green's saturation appear greener, in a very subtle way i would argue there is a contrast of temperature but rather on the extreme scale of red=boiling and blue=freezing yellow equals warm and green, cool. There is also a contrast in Hue (despite this being true of all colour comparisons that have a different colour, for the green and the yellow it is subtler, the two sit very closely on a colour wheel)

Not only do we see a contrast of tone, the green of the background being considerable darker but also a contrast of saturation, the background green is far more vibrant and saturated than the green on the scrap of paper. We can also see a contrast of extension, the only reason the scarp of paper looks so washed out is because of the amount of darker toned green surrounding it.

Here we can see a contrast of hue, the lightened tone of the green paper manages to further darken the tone of the blue when introduced to it, the green however becomes very yellow when swarmed by blue, almost changes hue entirely.

Blue Pen

The red is an extremely hot colour the blue a cold one, we see a very high contrast in temperature between these two. We also see, due to the darkened tone of the blue pen a slight lift in tone for the red, it becomes slightly less vibrant than it was before and a touch more pink.

Blue and orange opposites and complimentary contrasts, the blue of the pen desaturates the orange paper and the orange paper in turn darkens the tone of the pen rather greatly. 

Blue is cold, yellow is warm, here we a see a contrast a temperature as well as a contrast of extension (the pen takes up about 9% of the total space). The blue manages to darken the yellow and gives the whole piece of paper a green tint.

Here we see a contrast of hue, between the green and the blue and the tone, the background is a slot lighter than the pen. It appears that the only coloured paper thus far not to darken the ton elf the pen however is the green, which actually makes the colour appear ever so slightly more vibrant. 

The two types of blue display a contrast in saturation, extension and a contrast in tone, the blue paper's influence of the pen lightens the tone and brightens the colour whereas the pen desaturates the paper and fades the blue greatly (further exaggerated by the contrast of extension and the proportion of the pen to the paper)