Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

I found this app AK interactive has, its basically an electronic bookstore for their publications, and bought a book called "How to work with colours" by Carlos Vidal Vaz. Colour theory has interested me for a while, since I've been going "back to basics" and trying to relearn miniature painting, this time skipping Eavy Metal style tutorials and concentrating on the nitty gritty details instead..

So at first, I was really enthusiastic, learning about the 12 main colours of the colour wheel, learning about the Munsell scale, and how you could modulate colour without resorting to mixing black or white.. until it all made sense and things just clicked.

And now? I feel flocking miserable

I feel like this big veil of mystery is lifted, and all I see is examples of boring colour harmonic excercises. Pretty much everywhere I look now. Colours have lost a big part of their appeal to me. Let me make an analogy using music as an example - it's like learning the vast majority of music everywhere adheres to 12-tet system.. but unlike in music, where you at least have microtuning and all sorts of exotic scales (like used in ethnic music etc), its as if everything I see in the world of "art" (photography/paintings/etc) follows colour theiry conventions.. quite literally. How boring!

I have had this feeling for a while when studying miniatures painted by talented (some "professional" ones) people, there was always this unexplainable homogenousness to the way many used colour, and now I know what it is.. they are following the teachings of colour theory and are overly fixated on the "chromatic harmonies" in their paintjobs.. and to me old eye, that stuff looks "fake" for lack of a better term.

I think there is something in the real world the simplistic colour theory based on chromatics fails to address, something to do with light, not sure what it is, but it is missing from this picture.. I will keep on trying to learn more.. but for now, basic colour theory has "spoiled" me and I wish I never learned it.

I don't know what I'm trying to accomplish posting this.. just feel disillusioned and wanted to maybe ask what thoughts other people have regarding colour theory? Do you love it or hate it? Indifferent to it? I feel like its a skill that you dont necessarily need, but if you know it, you will need to learn how to break from it in the right places or your art will suffer for it..

 tauist wrote:
I found this app AK interactive has, its basically an electronic bookstore for their publications, and bought a book called "How to work with colours" by Carlos Vidal Vaz. Colour theory has interested me for a while, since I've been going "back to basics" and trying to relearn miniature painting, this time skipping Eavy Metal style tutorials and concentrating on the nitty gritty details instead..

So at first, I was really enthusiastic, learning about the 12 main colours of the colour wheel, learning about the Munsell scale, and how you could modulate colour without resorting to mixing black or white.. until it all made sense and things just clicked.

And now? I feel flocking miserable

I feel like this big veil of mystery is lifted, and all I see is examples of boring colour harmonic excercises. Pretty much everywhere I look now. Colours have lost a big part of their appeal to me. Let me make an analogy using music as an example - it's like learning the vast majority of music everywhere adheres to 12-tet system.. but unlike in music, where you at least have microtuning and all sorts of exotic scales (like used in ethnic music etc), its as if everything I see in the world of "art" (photography/paintings/etc) follows colour theiry conventions.. quite literally. How boring!

I have had this feeling for a while when studying miniatures painted by talented (some "professional" ones) people, there was always this unexplainable homogenousness to the way many used colour, and now I know what it is.. they are following the teachings of colour theory and are overly fixated on the "chromatic harmonies" in their paintjobs.. and to me old eye, that stuff looks "fake" for lack of a better term.

I think there is something in the real world the simplistic colour theory based on chromatics fails to address, something to do with light, not sure what it is, but it is missing from this picture.. I will keep on trying to learn more.. but for now, basic colour theory has "spoiled" me and I wish I never learned it.

I don't know what I'm trying to accomplish posting this.. just feel disillusioned and wanted to maybe ask what thoughts other people have regarding colour theory? Do you love it or hate it? Indifferent to it? I feel like its a skill that you dont necessarily need, but if you know it, you will need to learn how to break from it in the right places or your art will suffer for it..

As a graphic designer with an arts degree, I'll say you this - deep understanding of colour and composition is a necessary prerequisite to... consciously break it.

But to start at the beginning - people typically missinterpret colour theory as a tool to establish which colours "belong together". But it's not. Basic harmonies only tell you, which colours mixed together in equal proportions will result in gray. That's it. It is theory of mixing colours à rebours - a theory of colour balance. Of course there are other harmonies, that go beyond that, for example the simple analogous one, but the point stands - those are all about how to "unmix" a "balanced paint".

What you intuitively see around you in the real world but can't pinpoint, is that nature does not care about colour balance. Take the simplest example there is - a carrot. According to colour theory, carrot is unbalanced, it needs a violet to bring it back to equilibrium. Or it should have teal leaves instead of green ones. But you look at a carrot, and see nothing wrong with it. At all. It is a pleasant combination of colours.

Now, the bottom line is - in a miniature painting world, colour theory tells you, what colour the shadows of your OSL should be, and what should a result of your OSL on an armour of a given colour should be, but not what your colour your OSL should be in the first place.

Your comparison to music a good intuition, but at the same time it is inadequate. It is not about 12-tet vs microtonal, but wholetone scale vs tonal music. What you find boring in paintjobs all around is the lack of imbalance, same as in wholetone music - unresolved dominants, tensions, out-of-balance accents, surprise passages, out-of-chord progressions and embelishments etc. Or the opposite - the boring adherence to the "four chord trick" of pop music, which no longer works as an interesting tension-resolution because how overused it is.

Like it or not, when you start dealing with color you start dealing with how the human mind processes color and what it likes.

Color theory is a good tool, but it can lead to conformity, or even cowardice. Those painters you mention are probably trying to get commissions, so I wouldn't blame them for going with what appeals to the broadest set of their customer base. It's just good business sense.

Lots of other people will use the outcomes of color theory simply because our brains are wired to like the outcomes of color theory. They don't even have to know color theory to get there. Some aesthetics transcend all cultures of humanity and this is one of them.

With miniatures, color choice is important for the overall aesthetics of the army, but using the right colors doesn't mean you're a good painter. A skilled painter can make almost any color combination work, while a poor painter will struggle to make even the 'best' color scheme work.

It’s really good to know, and as said above, so you know how to break it in the proper ways.
Knowledge is never useless. It’s always in the application of that knowledge is where it counts.

I think this is a super interesting topic that I often think about. I've got a background in Art™ before being into the hobby, so I think I've had a lot more exposure to these ideas than the average mini painter. Putting too much stock in colour theory does make hollow-feeling art. But that doesn't mean understanding it isn't powerful.

I think, fundamentally, it is fair to say that aesthetics is largely about 'balance'. A composition should look balanced - otherwise it can look 'off' or just ugly.

Colour theory is an attempt to pin down, in specific semi-scientific terms, how to create balance (and therefore beauty) with colour. The problem with trying to come up with such a theory for beauty is about complexity.

Colour theory - and other theories of balance like contrast between light and dark - can be used very effectively in simple cases. Take Joseph Albers, an artist and academic, who did a lot of work on our understanding of colour. He produced a load of squares as part of his work and art on colour theory:
There's so much work here about the relative 'power' of colours and tones; the way that they attract the eye, and how 'strong' relatively colours and tones are to each other. These squares are extremely simple, and extremely balanced. This is a very close to pure application of colour theory, in a way that strips away all form and complexity. He is asking: Only considering colour how do we balance a composition?

These ideas on relative strength of colours and balance feeds directly into some very fundamental ideas about colour theory, such a Complimentary Colours. Two colours on the opposite side of the colour wheel balance each other our when placed together; they look nice. Again, working with simple colours and forms, these ideas can be explored. There was a lot of art in the 20th century about these ideas, and they are fascinating as an exploration of how colours interact. The work of Piet Mondrian for example is simple and geometric enough that you could almost work them out mathematically. The areas of colour are very specific in their size and placement, again separated by very specific areas of stark light and dark:
This is art using colour theory as it's primary principle. It is stripped back and pure, and easy to understand from a theory perspective because of that. But what happens if we make things more complex? Kandinsky, for example:

This is still simple colours, tones and shapes, but it's wildly more complex. It's beautifully balanced, in exactly the same ways as the 'pure' example, but you can't quantify it like you can with the early examples. You couldn't measure these areas of colour with a ruler, you can't reasonably apply the colour wheel here, not to the whole composition. There is too much going on.

Obviously things get a lot more complex than Kandinsky - when you start introducing shading, forms, perspective etc. This is where an intellectual understanding of colour theory can no longer carry you forward. If you want your art to have real 'life', you have to push beyond what you can 'figure out' by looking at charts and calculating the hex values of your colours.

This is the skill in art. People are reluctant to accept artist skill as real and concrete, but this instinctual understanding of colour and balance is what makes many famous artists so amazing. This is a skill, learned through hard practice and failure. How do I use colours to balance this composition? What can I change to make this look better? What does my eye tell me is missing?

That IS colour theory, but it is not colour theory that can be understood though reading. It's like learning how to kick a football. You can read 100 books and watch 100 videos about how to do it. But you won't be able to do it like Ronaldo. There is no way to explain the 'feel' that you develop, the memory in your muscle, the unconscious subtleties that you can't explain. That is what having an 'eye for colour' is. It's a hard-earned skill.



I had similar feelings to you when I learned colour theory first, but what came after was an amazing sense of appreciation. Looking at many of the classic 'great artists' I suddenly understood what made them so good. The colours are amazing. They are so balanced, so purposeful, despite being so complex you can't explain why it works. The more you learn the more you can judge the value of art you can see, and the more you can enjoy the really great stuff.

You aren't realizing that understanding color theory undermines art, you're understanding that most miniature painting is formulaic execution of stock techniques and not really art. Most of the stuff that is held up as great art in a miniatures context is paint by numbers stuff where quality is measured by how flawlessly you blend between two colors or how fine a freehand line you can paint and very little thought is given to theme, composition, etc. And it's full of people who aren't able to understand the difference between "opposing colors on the wheel maximize contrast" and "you must use opposing colors on the color wheel for your scheme". So you have formulaic paint by numbers pieces being judged by people whose entire education in art is producing their own formulaic paint by numbers pieces, people who think NMM is an "advanced technique" instead of something the mainstream art world has been doing for hundreds of years and any freshman art major can duplicate in their sleep. And so if you want to win you follow the rigid rules and emphasize the things the judges want to see.

The solution is not despair at the idea that color theory takes anything away from art, it's to start seeing color theory as a useful tool for understanding how we react to colors instead of a rigid set of rules to follow. Color theory can tell you that colors X and Y have high contrast, it can't tell you if you should be using a high-contrast look on a particular piece (or part of a piece) vs. a lower-contrast palette.

Just want to say that this is a really interesting thread. I know next to nothing about this but I can see that if colour theory seems like a trick that everyone's using it is going to be disappointing to be able to recognise that trick everywhere. Makes me reluctant to learn more about it myself. On the other hand it's got to be possible to learn the trick and then transcend it. The difference between workmanship and genius.I like the analogy to music that someone proposed. Anyone can learn a few chord progressions and how rhythm and melody work but still after hundreds of years of composition there are people who can knock it out of the park with something that totally surprises us.

 tauist wrote:


I feel like this big veil of mystery is lifted, and all I see is examples of boring colour harmonic excercises. Pretty much everywhere I look now. Colours have lost a big part of their appeal to me. Let me make an analogy using music as an example - it's like learning the vast majority of music everywhere adheres to 12-tet system.. but unlike in music, where you at least have microtuning and all sorts of exotic scales (like used in ethnic music etc), its as if everything I see in the world of "art" (photography/paintings/etc) follows colour theiry conventions.. quite literally. How boring!

I have had this feeling for a while when studying miniatures painted by talented (some "professional" ones) people, there was always this unexplainable homogenousness to the way many used colour, and now I know what it is.. they are following the teachings of colour theory and are overly fixated on the "chromatic harmonies" in their paintjobs.. and to me old eye, that stuff looks "fake" for lack of a better term.

I think there is something in the real world the simplistic colour theory based on chromatics fails to address, something to do with light, not sure what it is, but it is missing from this picture.. I will keep on trying to learn more.. but for now, basic colour theory has "spoiled" me and I wish I never learned it.

I don't know what I'm trying to accomplish posting this.. just feel disillusioned and wanted to maybe ask what thoughts other people have regarding colour theory? Do you love it or hate it? Indifferent to it? I feel like its a skill that you dont necessarily need, but if you know it, you will need to learn how to break from it in the right places or your art will suffer for it..

Perhaps I can help on the psychological side as I have been an autodidact at many trades to expertise levels and whenever I studied there was a sort of conflict I recognice in your post. I think the issue here is how you approach the material as a sort of final answer, trumping your abillity to explore.
Note the word theory on color theory, it is just one way to look at things, and believe me .. all calculations are but a perspective which works in that particular calculation but doesn't necessarily work in reality. In fact most scientific mathematics work that way in that it is a universe of its own. And so does the color -theory-.

Imagine a painting made out of pixels (which technically is how we perceive the world of color to begin with through the limited perspective and resolution of the human eye) you can make out many colors up close but the more you zoom out the more they blend into pastel and greyscale versions.

The comparisan with music is quite interesting to me because I used to be a videogame-music-composer with multiple OST's on my name and I can say that I have simply rejected most forms of music-theory and went the way of counterpoint, with it also designing a technique for my own I have never seen anyone else used when it comes to the reverb-free perfect pitch (and cymatic therefor) sound of chip electronics enabling blending with shorter and longer waveforms to create very interesting results. (a more physical approach to sound)

You see, now you know one color-theory (wether or no universally accepted as more than that) but that doesn't mean that you have to abide by it at all. Design your own color-theory. You won't make any mistakes.. and if its hard think of it this way; Who says that the way other people percieve the color green is identical to how you percieve the color green? Personally.. I cannot for the life of me understand why some people think green and purple looks good together because I find that the most offensively contrasting combination that exists. I'd sooner color my entire house pink and orange. But color-'theory' sympathizers will say that such contrasts are meant to be together..

My color theory states that all things combine well with greys and pastels and less with black and whites, and then ultimately get wonky when combined with other colors. The more on the grey scale the better something combines, brown (on the gray scale) combined greatly with practically every single color. This is called a metal color, and metal colors like grey, beige and brown have simply a naturally emphasis toward the light spectrum (light=/=sound=/= the seed of physical creation, esoterically) of colors. But like with sound/music the waveform can conflict and create points of friction (tremor). Then there is also a rather interesting combination which creates an impossible-color; blue-yellow is the most known of these.
It blends into a sort of hard to describe grey, like a grey that is the sun and the sea at once (very esoteric subject here).

You see, color-theory is only a spec of dust in the desert of this science. And there is (even for me!!) much more to learn.
So look bright, and keep on learning and experimenting.

-Leopold Helveine.

 Leopold Helveine wrote:

 tauist wrote:


I feel like this big veil of mystery is lifted, and all I see is examples of boring colour harmonic excercises. Pretty much everywhere I look now. Colours have lost a big part of their appeal to me. Let me make an analogy using music as an example - it's like learning the vast majority of music everywhere adheres to 12-tet system.. but unlike in music, where you at least have microtuning and all sorts of exotic scales (like used in ethnic music etc), its as if everything I see in the world of "art" (photography/paintings/etc) follows colour theiry conventions.. quite literally. How boring!

I have had this feeling for a while when studying miniatures painted by talented (some "professional" ones) people, there was always this unexplainable homogenousness to the way many used colour, and now I know what it is.. they are following the teachings of colour theory and are overly fixated on the "chromatic harmonies" in their paintjobs.. and to me old eye, that stuff looks "fake" for lack of a better term.

I think there is something in the real world the simplistic colour theory based on chromatics fails to address, something to do with light, not sure what it is, but it is missing from this picture.. I will keep on trying to learn more.. but for now, basic colour theory has "spoiled" me and I wish I never learned it.

I don't know what I'm trying to accomplish posting this.. just feel disillusioned and wanted to maybe ask what thoughts other people have regarding colour theory? Do you love it or hate it? Indifferent to it? I feel like its a skill that you dont necessarily need, but if you know it, you will need to learn how to break from it in the right places or your art will suffer for it..

Perhaps I can help on the psychological side as I have been an autodidact at many trades to expertise levels and whenever I studied there was a sort of conflict I recognice in your post. I think the issue here is how you approach the material as a sort of final answer, trumping your abillity to explore.
Note the word theory on color theory, it is just one way to look at things, and believe me .. all calculations are but a perspective which works in that particular calculation but doesn't necessarily work in reality. In fact most scientific mathematics work that way in that it is a universe of its own. And so does the color -theory-.

Imagine a painting made out of pixels (which technically is how we perceive the world of color to begin with through the limited perspective and resolution of the human eye) you can make out many colors up close but the more you zoom out the more they blend into pastel and greyscale versions.

The comparisan with music is quite interesting to me because I used to be a videogame-music-composer with multiple OST's on my name and I can say that I have simply rejected most forms of music-theory and went the way of counterpoint, with it also designing a technique for my own I have never seen anyone else used when it comes to the reverb-free perfect pitch (and cymatic therefor) sound of chip electronics enabling blending with shorter and longer waveforms to create very interesting results. (a more physical approach to sound)

You see, now you know one color-theory (wether or no universally accepted as more than that) but that doesn't mean that you have to abide by it at all. Design your own color-theory. You won't make any mistakes.. and if its hard think of it this way; Who says that the way other people percieve the color green is identical to how you percieve the color green? Personally.. I cannot for the life of me understand why some people think green and purple looks good together because I find that the most offensively contrasting combination that exists. I'd sooner color my entire house pink and orange. But color-'theory' sympathizers will say that such contrasts are meant to be together..

My color theory states that all things combine well with greys and pastels and less with black and whites, and then ultimately get wonky when combined with other colors. The more on the grey scale the better something combines, brown (on the gray scale) combined greatly with practically every single color. This is called a metal color, and metal colors like grey, beige and brown have simply a naturally emphasis toward the light spectrum (light=/=sound=/= the seed of physical creation, esoterically) of colors. But like with sound/music the waveform can conflict and create points of friction (tremor). Then there is also a rather interesting combination which creates an impossible-color; blue-yellow is the most known of these.
It blends into a sort of hard to describe grey, like a grey that is the sun and the sea at once (very esoteric subject here).

You see, color-theory is only a spec of dust in the desert of this science. And there is (even for me!!) much more to learn.
So look bright, and keep on learning and experimenting.

-Leopold Helveine.

You mistake an individual colour harmony rule, which there are multiple, with colour theory as a whole. You then further confuse it with personal aesthetic preferences. And the reason why you can always find a brown that goes well with other colours is that browns are tertiary colours. Nothing esotheric here.

You might also read/explore more about modular synthesis - a whole field of both knowledge and music genre.

 Leopold Helveine wrote:


...I have been an autodidact at many trades to expertise levels.

...And there is (even for me!!) much more to learn.

I can't speak about your understanding of colour theory, but you could sure learn to be humble

I know what you're trying to say here. What you're feeling is the nihilism that comes with deconstruction. You can break a violin apart to decipher how it creates the beautiful music, but then it can no longer create that music.

However, the best thing to do is look at in in a different way. Someone has to know those things, otherwise the beauty wouldn't be able to be created in the first place, and we're unfortunately at a place in human history where so much has been formulated and discovered already. Try focusing on how you make those colours work in your own pieces. Colour theory is fine, but simply slapping purple and yellow or red and green together doesn't make something good colour wise. Its like you say, it feels unnatural, uncanny. The trick is working the colours in a way that creates a good balance of contrast, visual interest and compliment.

Its like when I choose a drink to go with my cigars. Something with a little sweetness makes a cigar with strong flavours just so much better. Anyway, hope thinking along these lines might help you out of your funk a little.

What ever you do don’t learn the guitar. You’ll ruin all your favourite songs in the same way

mrFickle wrote:
What ever you do don’t learn the guitar. You’ll ruin all your favourite songs in the same way

Learn accordion instead, you’ll be able to appreciate this instrument far better.

And in all seriousness, I haven’t attempt to learn either french nor german to not spoil songs sung in those languages. This way I can appreciate pure musical value and not be distracted by mediocre or straight up awfull lyrics

Appreciate the thoughtful responses everyone! I suppose my frustrations are actually a good sign, they will motivate me forward into learning how to break the basic rules.. and now, at least I know the theoretical starting points for duplicating any OOP aclylic colour, which at least is clearly a valuable skill.

Cheers

I use a lot of purple, (got to keep my gaming-sponsor/Wife happy) and I do not like to use green with the orange the colour wheel suggests.

Lots of models do well with a main colour, and a few spots of compliments. Metallics do not show up often in colour theory in the painting guides I have read, and I use them all over my models. They probably counts as greys and browns though.

My Guard models are grey with brown armour panels and Leadbelcher for machinery. Any colour works on them.

nou wrote:



You mistake an individual colour harmony rule, which there are multiple, with colour theory as a whole.

Actually I literally adressed that difference.

You then further confuse it with personal aesthetic preferences. And the reason why you can always find a brown that goes well with other colours is that browns are tertiary colours. Nothing esotheric here.

There is an esoteric layer to absolutely everything as all things come from light(sound) and water and their relation.

You might also read/explore more about modular synthesis - a whole field of both knowledge and music genre.

That is practically what I perform but require no visuals of having perfect pitch hearing and plenty of module plugins (other than would there actually exist a virtual cymatic interface in real time.. that would be my dream plug in.)

umm, I think you misquoted me there.. I didn't write those replies?

 tauist wrote:
umm, I think you misquoted me there.. I didn't write those replies?

Thanks for the notice, fixed it.
displaced one of the tags in the quote of Nou while shortening it.