THE ELEMENT OF COLOUR Colour is the visible perceptual property of an object, which is also the visual representation of the hue that the object appears to be to the human eye. It is the fascinating element of design, which enhances the physical identity of objects and make them visible to the human eyes. It may have the distinction of being one of the pure or primary colours or one of the secondary colours or more typically, it may be some combination of two or more of these. Even though it requires a highly scientific description of how the human eye perceives colour, it is generally been stated that when one sees an object that appears as red, that object is in effect absorbing all the colours except for those in the red range. They are reflected to the eye to be perceived as colour red. Colour is the most pervasive element of design that has significant psychological effects on our moods and emotions. Every artist, architects inclusive, need to understand the language of colour because the emotions that works of art are said to possess are actually accentuated by the presence of colour. In fact, the impact of works of art, design, and advertisements on the viewing public is conjured by the magical potency of colour. Colour as a visual element affects us in our everyday lives. It brings out the forms of objects of nature as defined by the other elements of design. It helps us to interpret our environment very well. For example, we know at what time a fruit is ripe to eat by its colour, Colour also affects our mood and feelings. It can create a calm environment or make the atmosphere in a room appear tense. In fact, without colour, we will not be able to differentiate among objects. As designers, we use pigments to interpret the variations in colour perception. Artists use the primary colours of pigment to generate

Compiled by Dr G. Y. Annum KNUST Gh Last update: 11/02/2014 10:55 AM

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other colours for painting. The primary colours of artist pigment are different from the primary colours of light as projected in physics. The artist often talks about the colour wheel as a tool for understanding colour and relationships among various colours. The basic colour wheel constitutes twelve (12) hues. This is not to conclude that there are only twelve colours available for the artists to use. A colour wheel could have as few as 6 hues or as many as 24, 48, 96 or even more. The COLOUR WHEEL is made up of primary, secondary, tertiary colours and the neutral Grey Primary colours: (fig 1) There are three primary colours. They are the hues; yellow, blue and red. These three colours are the hues that in theory can be mixed to produce all other colours. If you mix the three primary colours in equal proportion, will produce a colour close to black (neutral grey).

Yellow

Red

Blue

Fig 1: Primary colours Compiled by Dr G. Y. Annum KNUST Gh Last update: 11/02/2014 10:55 AM

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Secondary colours: (fig 2) By mixing two primary hues in equal proportions, a secondary colour is created. There are three secondary hues. They are green, violet or purple and orange. Orange is obtained by mixing red and yellow, violet or purple is obtained from a mixture of blue and red, and green results from a mixture of yellow and blue.

Orange

Green

Violet or Purple

Fig 2: Secondary Colours

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Tertiary colours: (fig 3) When one part of a primary hue is mixed with two parts of the adjacent primary hue on the colour wheel, the resultant colour is a tertiary colour or intermediate colour. This is to say that a mixture of a primary hue and the adjacent secondary hue in equal proportion produces a tertiary colour. There are six tertiary colours on the colour wheel of twelve. They are yellow-green, blue-green, blue-violet, redviolet, red-orange, and yellow-orange. The names begin with the primary colour before the secondary, as in yellow-green and not green-yellow. A tertiary colour is therefore said to be analogous to the adjacent primary or secondary colour because they are closely related. Hence we can say that Orange, Yellow-orange and Yellow are analogous.

yellow-orange

yellow-green

Blue-green

Red-orange

Red-violet

Blue-violet

Fig 3: Tertiary Colours

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Warm Grey (fig 4) A perfect grey is generally obtained by mixing black and white. In colour work, a mixture of the three primary colours in equal proportion will produce a warm grey that is usually referred to as brown. Different shades or temperature of the grey can be obtained by mixing the three primary colours in varying proportions. We can create blue-grey, red-grey, green-grey etc. Greys which gravitate towards blue and green are cool greys whilst those towards red and yellow are the warm greys

Fig 4: Warm grey

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