Colour Theory Made Understandable

Hello Everyone,

in our hobby, I find one of the most challenging the quest to find your own paint scheme. I have read tons of articles, seen quite a few tutorials but failed to find something that would voice what I seek in a language that I understand. Until now. I hereby give you the following articles that will hopefully make you not only understand the basics of colour theory, but correct some of the common misconceptions and will show you how easy it is to find your own theme and what really differs a great scheme from the "OK" one... It is well worth to read completely and follow suggested links.

Beginning

Colour Theory I

Colour Theory II

The series continues with some really good info especially for beginners. Links can be found in the article or googled.

Hope you will find it as useful as I have.

EDIT: you might find this colour scheme tool helpful as well.

That's kind of interesting (and well written).

Today I got to learn that I use analogic color schemes with clashing to the core yet complementary to each other accent colors in basically all of my armies. (for instance, my DE are blues to purple - but with red and green as the accents and nary a trace of yellow)

I'm not sure what that means or doesn't mean, but I guess it helps me understand what I 'feel' looks good.

Triad scheme? Check.
High colour saturation? Check.
Taste the (Dark) Rainbow!

Well i can't make a Kabal of the Burning Misery and go paint it in desaturated colours now, can i?
Also sensual overload is kinda the point of Dark Eldar isn't it?
I hope that also brings something to the table in terms of psychological warfare

Thank you! These are some awesome articles, and a great beginning point for someone trying to come up with my own colour scheme as I begin with Dark Eldar. It also explains why the red bolters always looked better than black ones on Dark Angels to me .

One question I do have is how do you balance a realistic or believable look against making an appealing colour scheme? What I mean is, when you set the armor/clothes/uniform to a certain colour scheme, what happens when the natural features on a model might clash with that?

More specifically, for my army I would like to get away from every model having the exact same hair and skin colour (while striking on the table, it's not something I personally like). Instead, I would love to have my army with a range of elf-like skin tones and hair colours. But, I need to consider this along with my plans to also use some sort of bright, Corsair-inspired primary colour on the armor (though it can change). Any suggestions?

I use mixed hair tones in my Eldar and DE ad mixed hair and skin in my IG - I don't think it makes much of an issue at all just as long as they're kept in rough (oh wait, let me use the right word) analogic scheme with each other. At least as far as skin goes.

With hair, especially with Wyches, I just went hog wild - and it almost invariably seems to look good in a punk rocker sort of way.

Well take some inspiration from fashion. I find it invaluable to ask several of my friends (girls) about the colour choices. For example - keeping the main tone black will allow you a wide variety of hair/skin tones. I havent seen a rocker in black leather looking bad, no matter the colour of hair or accessories. Black (as well as white usually) ties everything together as long as it is the majority.

The main decision is in what do you want the focal points of your miniature to be and what will make a background. For example in this picture, the focal point is the armour and weapons and accessories make up the background.
On the other hand in this picture the focal point are the gems, hair and sash.
And this mini has it evenly distributed.

As soon as you decide that, you will be able to adapt every mini to the scheme. Think a little ahead though. As in how would Trueborn differentiate, cloaks, etc.

I wouldnt trouble too much with the realistic look. The minis are yours and they should be pleasing mainly to your eye. And we are playing a fantasy in space, so anything can happen... :-)

And going for the corsair themed army gives you as wide variety of choices as these harlequins.

EDIT: Remember also that whatever crazy hair or skin colour you choose, you can always tie it back to the main theme by making a strip of hair or a tatoo on skin with a colour very close to the major colour you chose. For example if you have bright blue armour and make a wych that has green hair, make it a gradient to the blue or turquoise on the edges, thus bringing back to the fold.

Here's a pic of some of my wyches in the middle of the action.
The hair is a wild grab bag ranging from white to blonde to red to neon pink.
I think the overall color scheme of the army that they show everywhere else ties them together just fine, and the outlandish hair just becomes an accent note that is meant to be striking or complementary and all ends up working together.

Others might hate it though... :shrug:
But I think it works fine.

Well DE are aliens who indulge themselves in every fashion, no matter how extreme... need I say more? :-)

Thanks again, plenty more useful information!

And I totally agree, space elves of the year 40k can look however the painter wants! It's just my own preference to prefer organic, natural colours for hair and skin (think Tolkein elves as an indication), at least on this particular army. I may even include Fenrisian Wolves (or some suitable alien beast thing) in the place of Grots for this independent corsair band.

I'm thinking as a painter who hasn't put brush to model in a long time, drawing the focus to the armor *cough*easiest to paint bit*cough* may be safer. I also think it will do well with the flashy Corsair theme, and allow for the variation in hair colour to fade into the background.

Those harlies are absolutely stunning. It's making me seriously consider looking at trying different colour armor for different units.

If I may add my opinion - the totally different colours in armour is more of a Harlequin thing and should the rumoured supplement come out, you might deprive yourself of a chance to have your Harlies really stand out of the rest of the army.

I toyed with disticntive units myself as I consider my DE as corsairs too, but in the end I realized that every corsair band has one paint scheme. They build their reputation and therefore need to be recognized on sight.