Changing Color Models

Every artist I know was taught the Red-Blue-Yellow (RBY) color model. Red + Yellow = Orange. Red + Blue = Violet. Blue + Yellow = Green. This was the foundation for our understanding of color theory.

Much later in life I learned that there are colors not represented on the RBY color wheel. Those colors are Cyan and Magenta. Cyan and Magenta, which are part of the Cyan-Magenta-Yellow (CMY) color model are fairly recent inventions that were developed for use in printing in the late 19th century.

As I work with fabric, and quite a few of those fabrics have printed patterns, I have been using the CMY model for the past few years. However, that didn't work for my latest design and I had to go back to my roots.

I wanted to make a green dragon with red feathers, and he’s chasing a gold mechanical dragonfly. I am very much a design first, analyze it later kind of person, and that was no exception here. I pulled the design out of my brain in Concepts and Illustrator, and that idea looked like this:

High Stakes version 1

There is no color harmony on the CMY color wheel that would let me use Yellow, Red, and either Green or Yellow Green just by themselves. Split Complementary is close, but I’d have had to use Violet instead of Red. Hexadic would have also worked if I added Cyan and Blue, but I didn’t want those colors.

I just couldn’t figure out how to make my vision work using the CMY model, so I turned to an RBY model. I reasoned that I had no intention of using Cyan, so it was sort of like I didn’t have access to that color. The RBY model doesn’t have Cyan on it, so would it work? The answer was yes, with some slight modifications.

It turns out that Split Complementary would work just fine in RBY if I changed the Red to Red-Violet. In addition to changing the feathers, I also adjusted the green to be more Green and less Yellow-Green in order to simplify the harmony from 4-color to 3-color. The re-colored artwork looked like this:

High Stakes version 2

I was surprised (in a good way) to find that I liked the new colors even better. The Red and Yellow-Green of the original design clash, but the Red-Violet and Green don’t. I also really like how the dragon's mouth works as Red-Violet (it didn't really fit with the Red in the first version). With the color change to his feathers, he feels more like a real creature.

Trust but Verify

I already keep the idea of color theory and color harmonies in the back of my mind when designing something new, but this experience was a great example of how important it is to trust but verify, and be open to making changes if necessary.

In other words, trust my intuition that my mental vision is solid and worthwhile, but verify my creation against color theory to make sure it's in balance. I might find that everything is spot-on and no changes are needed. Or, I might find my color choices are just a bit off, and with a little tweaking, I can make my art even better.