how to use a colour wheel
The history of this tool goes way back to the early 1700s, and is essential for artists and designers to know. Grasping the fundamentals of the colour wheel will help significantly in your colour combo choices, especially if you’re not well-versed in the universe of colour theory.
How It Works
A simple colour wheel consists of 12 colour hues arranged around a central hub.A colour wheel consisting of primary, secondary, and tertiary colours.
All colours come from some combination of primary colours. The three primary colors are red, blue, and yellow. These three colours are essentially the parents of all the other colours.Mixing equal parts of any two of the primary colours results in the creation of secondary colours. Red + Blue = Purple. Blue + Yellow = Green. Red + Yellow = Orange.
Tertiary colours are those that come from mixing one of the primary colours with one of the nearest secondary colours. Tertiary colours are found in between all of the primary colours and secondary colors. Red + Orange = Red-orange. Yellow + Orange = Yellow-orange. Yellow + Green = Yellow-green. Blue + Green = Blue-green. Blue + Purple = Blue-purple. Red + Purple = Red-purple.
Warm Versus Cool – “Warm” colours are those that resemble or symbolize heat, while “cool” colours are attributed to ice and cooler temperatures. For example: red, orange, yellow, and red-purple are warm colours, while blue, purple, green are cool colours.
So the question is, how to match colours using a colour wheel? It's very wasy and you you have many ways how to use a colour wheel :)
Monochrome Combinations
A monochrome colour combination is different variations of a single hue.This combination consists of varying tints, shades, and tones of the chosen hue.
Complementary Combinations
Complementary colours exist directly across from one another on the colour wheel. These colours have high contrast to one another and, if used improperly, can be very visually jarring. If used well, they can make your design boldly stand out with high contrast.
Examples of complementary color combinations:
Red and green / Blue and orange / Yellow and purple / Yellow-green and red-purple / Red-orange and blue-green
Analogous Combinations
These colour combinations sit directly side by side on the colour wheel. These harmonious blends evoke serenity and peace. Some say this is due to analogous combinations existing so frequently in the natural world. It is recommended that you choose a primary colour as a base, then choose two more to highlight, usually a secondary and a tertiary colour.
Examples of analogous combinations:
Violet, blue, and teal / Red, fuschia, and purple / Red, orange, and yellow / Green, blue, and purple
Triadic Combinations
These simple colour combos are variants of the split complementary colour scheme. The colours in this composition are found equally spaced on the colour wheel. It’s like taking an equilateral triangle and placing it on the colour wheel.
Tetradic Combinations
Like the triadic combination, the tetradic colour combination involves colours that are equidistant apart, except these colour combos use four colours instead of three. You can get a tetradic combination by placing a square on the colour wheel and choosing the colours at each corner, or you can choose two sets of complementary colours.
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As you can see, it is very easy to use colour wheel. I have a POST on Instragram regarding colour wheel and how to use it.
