[English] Colors for a meaningful web
Vibrant colors par tanakawho
An important part of our work of designers is the choice of colors we will use. And the colors we would use are the ones that correspond to the meaning we want to give to our work.
Here I will give you the way I use colors in my work, as a memorandum.F irst, I will define any things :
The tonality of color
Colors have tonality. And we can distinguish three major tones of color, according to this article of info-graphistes.com :
- Neutral tones : that colors are the skeleton key of your work. They are pretty used as backgrounds or shades.
- Flashy tones : that colors are vibrant and high-contrasted. They focus the leadings messages of the work.
- Pastel tones : that colors are sweet and pleasant to see. They are used to show the content and the choices the user will have.
A great design will take advantage of all those tonalities. I usually use one flashy tone, two or three pastel tones and two or three neutral tones.
The temperature of color
It’s well-known that colors are warm or cold. Warm colors add a dynamic, active and social meaning to the content. Cold colors add a professional, calm and powerful meaning to the content.
Le Yin et le Yang
Like in the yin-yang figure, a great design cannot be made only of cold colors, or only of warm colors. A good design must use a subtle mix of warm and cold colors.
Choose colors :
Obviously, the colors are meaningful. Here is a example table of principal colors declined into three tones, from warm to cold ones, and the meaning of each one :
| Flashy tone | Pastel tone | Neutral tone | Meaning |
| Red : action, confidence, vitality, dynamism, courage, power | |||
| Yellow : wisdom, intellectual, joy, information | |||
| Green : nature, life, hope, accessibility, opening, fertility | |||
| Cyan : aerial, cold, light, receptive, transitory | |||
| Blue : youth, truth, peace, attentive | |||
| Magenta : infantile, creative, artistic, new | |||
| Black : secret, alone, simplicity, luxury | |||
| White : space, purity, innocence, cleanliness, verbal | |||
| Flashy tone | Pastel tone | Neutral tone | Meaning |
This table is an example only. You can refer of the info-graphistes’ article I quoted above for a practical example of colors based on trademarks.
Those colors are obviously not the only ones to be used for design. More, it would be an error to use them into design : you’ll never find one of those into nature, and their purity of primary and secondary colors make them sound false.
Get your own ones like a painter mixing them onto yours photoshop’s pallet and please, be creative !
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