Colour Theory

The Importance of Colour Charts

The image above is a large colour chart, part of my extensive collection of colour charts. While this one may seem intimidating in size, most of my colour charts are only A4 (21 cm x 29 cm). But why go to all this effort to create colour charts? Let me take you back four decades to when I first set out to master realistic oil landscape painting.

Back in my school days, I loved drawing, but painting was unfamiliar territory. To develop my skills, I studied under two art teachers: Professor Raymond De Cusack and Michael Zaiter. Each class had around ten students per three-hour lesson, and the first thing we learned? Colour charts. Years later, when I attended Eastern Sydney TAFE, the same principle applied—before diving into painting, we studied colour theory and created various colour wheels and charts. This foundational practice remains invaluable to artists today.

Understanding Colour Charts

The chart above is painted on 300gsm paper, with a few layers of gesso primer applied before measuring the grid for the colour squares.

Why use gesso? It’s essential to apply gesso as an undercoat or binder when using oil paints on paper. Gesso creates a protective barrier, preventing solvents from seeping into the paper. Without it, the paper deteriorates over time, losing its archival properties.

Primary Colours and Their Temperatures

The three primary colours are Red, Blue, and Yellow.

Quick Quiz: Did you know that all colours have temperature variations?

That’s right! Every colour can be classified as either warm or cool.

For example:

• There is a warm yellow (cadmium) and a cool yellow (lemon).
• A warm red (vermillion) and a cool red (crimson).
• And so on!

This concept is best understood using the Colour Wheel.

The Colour Wheel: A Must-Have Tool

The colour wheel is an essential tool for artists and designers, helping to understand colour relationships. It visually explains key principles of colour interaction.

Colours are arranged in a circular format, progressing from yellow → yellow-green → green → blue-green → blue → blue-violet → violet → red-violet → red → red-orange → orange → yellow-orange.

• Cool colours (Receding Colours): Yellow-green to violet.
• Warm colours (Advancing Colours): Red-violet to yellow.

How Do You Create a Cool Yellow?

To make a cool yellow, simply mix a touch of any cool colour (from the cool side of the wheel) into your yellow. This principle applies to warming or cooling any colour.

Interesting Fact: Studies have shown that colour can influence our perception of temperature. Subjects in a blue-green painted room reported feeling colder than those in the same room repainted in red-orange. This suggests that warm colours may psychologically speed up metabolism!

Exploring the Colour Wheel

At this point, I won’t dive into every aspect of value, tone, complementary colours, etc., as they are all illustrated in the colour wheel itself. If you’ve never used one before, take your time to explore it. Read everything, absorb the details, and try to work out the relationships between colours.

The colour wheel I use was purchased from Eckersley’s, but I am sure you can purchase one from most independent art stores. This particular model is double-sided, with two layers of rotating cardboard. By adjusting the top layer, you can see the complementary colours of each hue through small window slots.

For example:

• Orange-red is the complementary colour of blue-green.
• If you rotate the arrow to point to blue, you’ll see that orange is its complementary colour.
• This applies to all colour relationships—just turn the dial!

The Benefits of Making Colour Charts

Here are four key reasons why colour charts are invaluable, especially for beginner artists:

1. Developing Scaling Skills:
   • Drawing a grid helps with scaling artwork accurately.
   • Example: If you’re creating a pet portrait, using grids ensures proportional accuracy without relying on mechanical copying methods.
2. Improving Brush Control:
   • Filling in colour squares teaches how to hold a brush properly.
   • Learning how to cut into an area builds confidence before working on an actual painting.
3. Understanding Tone & Value:
   • Keeping tints evenly spaced trains your eye to judge proportions correctly.
   • The greyscale on the colour wheel shows tonal relationships (e.g., Value 2 is midway between Values 1 and 3).
   • Mixing small amounts prevents wasting paint and improves colour-matching skills.
4. Creating a Personal Colour Library:
   • A well-made colour chart serves as a reference for future paintings.
   • If you make charts for each colour group on the colour wheel, you’ll reap the rewards of having a comprehensive catalogue of colours at your fingertips.
   • Look up the colour you want to match and at a glance, make the colour – instead of wasting time and paint trying to figure out what is missing or needed.

The first Browns Scale Chart (top line) starts with hues straight from the tube. Then, I gradually added Titanium White to create tints. While some artists prefer seven or nine tonal steps, I find that five is enough to perceive subtle variations. 

In the Blues Scale Chart, you can see the subtle temperature characteristics which is very important when painting the sky or ocean.

• Example: Look at the bottom row of tones. The colour under Old Holland Ultramarine Violet is a very warm purplish colour and therefore, not suited for painting oceans.

The Colour Chart Breakdown

Let’s return to the large colour chart at the top of this post. Here’s how I structured it:

1. First Row – Pure hues straight from the tube (labelled above each colour).
2. Second Row – Each hue mixed 50/50 with Titanium White.
   • I loosely blended the colours, creating a natural gradient within each square.
3. Third Row – Each hue mixed 50/50 with Sap Green.
4. Fourth Row – A combination of the previous row’s mixtures, plus 50/50 Titanium White.

By following this structured approach, I was able to see how different hues interact, particularly when adding white or secondary colours. This level of experimentation provides deeper insight into how colours shift depending on their combinations.

Final Thoughts

Creating colour charts might seem time-consuming, but the benefits far outweigh the effort. They help you:

• Improve accuracy in mixing colours
• Develop a trained eye for tone and value
• Build confidence in brush control
• Create a personalised reference for future projects

After completing my large colour chart, I took it a step further by adding blues down the side, then another version with reds. Now, there’s no more guesswork when I need to match a colour. All the examples in this blog are created with oil paints. While I haven’t done the same for acrylics, the principles remain the same.

Advanced Colour Theory – The Elements of Colour by Johannes Itten

Johannes Itten, born in 1888 in Switzerland, he was a master of colour theory. His book, The Elements of Colour, is an invaluable resource for any serious artist.

Itten didn’t just study colour—he dedicated over 50 years of his life to understanding it. He analyzed and compared the work of colourist masters, formulating his own extensive theories. To demonstrate how comprehensive his knowledge is, I’ve pulled a few pages from his book to highlight key concepts.

Light-Dark Contrast

In this example from Itten’s book, he discusses the importance of understanding light and dark contrasts. Image 13 shows all colours with equal brilliance, whereas image 14 focuses on equal darkness. At first glance, the yellow square in the middle seems brighter than the surrounding colours. However, if you squint your eyes, blurring the colours together, you’ll see they share the same tonal value. This technique helps artists gauge true brightness and contrast in their work.

Contrast of Extension

Two factors determine the force of colour: extent and brilliance. The extension of a colour refers to how much visual space it occupies. Take image 47, for example—although the yellow and violet squares are of equal size, the yellow squares dominate the real estate, meaning – the yellow jumps out at the viewer. Despite being complementary colours, the imbalance makes them feel disharmonious. Yet the red and green example seems to be balanced, therefore their brilliance is matched, and harmonious.

Don’t confuse saturation (colour intensity) with brilliance (brightness). Brilliance is determined by a hue’s light value. Interestingly, colours have different levels of intensity—yellow, for instance, is three times more brilliant than violet. To achieve balance in a composition, you’d need to adjust the colour proportions accordingly.

For example, to make yellow and violet appear harmoniously balanced, violet should take up three-quarters of the space compared to yellow (Image 42).

Yellow-Blue Tonal Chart

The above example is a gradual transition from yellow to blue, with tints on the left and shades on the right. This series of colour charts and scales was painted using gouache back in 2003 while I was studying Fine Arts at TAFE.

16-Segment Colour Wheel

This is a 16-segment colour wheel where I added an extra graduation between the primary colours. The middle section demonstrates how mixing two primary colours produces the secondary colour—for example, yellow + red = orange.

Fun Fact: The Magic of Complementary Colours

Did you know that mixing two complementary colours in equal proportions creates grey?

• Red + Green = Grey
• Blue + Orange = Grey
• Yellow + Violet = Grey

Colour Contrast

In the example above, the pattern remains the same, yet simply changing the colours alters the entire mood and perception of the image. This illustrates how colour alone can evoke different emotions and responses.

Final Thoughts

Colour theory is so vast and fascinating that I could go on for hours—actually, days or weeks! But for now, I hope this has whetted your appetite and inspired you to dive deeper into the world of colour. Whether you’re mixing oils, acrylics, or gouache, understanding colour relationships will elevate your work to the next level.

If you haven’t made colour charts before, I highly recommend starting one today! Not only will it elevate your understanding of colour, but it will also enhance your overall painting technique.

Happy painting!