1. Basic Elements of “Design”
Form/Depth: Line/Shape/Dimension/Perspective/
Balance/Texture
Movement & Rhythm : Dynamic vs. Static Movement/
Repetition/Pattern/Implied Line (Psychic Wire)
Light: Color & Saturation, Contrast/Value (Brightness/
Shadow)

2. Mood…
Black & White and
monochromatic colors can
lend a dreamy, thoughtful or
reflective state.
Transparent layering also
romance or dreamlike
contemplation.

3. Color Impact & Mood
• Red: Action, aggression/
assertiveness/danger
• Yellow: Demands attention;
high readability
• Green: Symbol of health &
prosperity
• Blue: Tranquility, stability
• Black: Sophistication
• Orange: Evokes “edibility”
• Purple: Risk-taking

4. Red Hot.
Red Hot.
Advertisers use red to attract customers’
attention.
Consumers are attracted to red because it
awakens in them feelings of warmth,
passion and sensuality.

5. Blue Period.
Corporate advertisers love blue.
USA Today says, ”The ad
business is feeling blue—
literally.”
Blue is the USA's favorite color
The use of blue gets consumers to
open up to the message.
Blue suggests upscale elegance.
Blue also represents technology
and the future.

6. General Mental Direct Objective Subjective
Color
Appearance Associations Associations Associations Impressions
danger,
Christmas, 4th
intensity,
brilliant, Hot, fire, of July, passionate,
Red rage,
intense,opaque,dry heat, blood Valentine's exciting active
fierceness
Day, Mother's
Day, flag
Warm, jovial, lively, hilarity,
bright, luminous, Halloween,
Orange metallic, energetic, exuberance,
glowing Thanksgiving
autumnal forceful satiety
sunny, cheerful,
high spirit,
Yellow incandescent, sunlight caution inspiring, vital,
health
radiant celestial
quieting, ghastliness,
cool, nature, clear, St.
Green clear, moist refreshing, disease,
water Patrick's Day
peaceful terror, guilt
subduing,
gloom,
cold, sky, melancholy,
Blue transparent, wet service, flag fearfulness,
water, ice contemplative,
furtiveness
sober
dignified,
cool, mist,
deep, soft, mourning, pompous, loneliness,
Purple darkness,
atmospheric Easter mournful, desperation
shadow
mystic
cleanliness, brightness of
pure, clean,
White spatial - light cool, snow Mother's Day, spirit,
frank, youthful
flag normality
funeral,
neutral,
ominous, negation of
Black spatial - dark night, mourning
deadly, spirit, death
emptiness
depressing

7. Basic Elements of “Color
Theory”
Hue
Saturation
Tints/Tones/Shades
Warmth vs. Coolness
Color Adjacency (Analogous Colors)
Complementary Colors
Monochromatic design

8. The Color Wheel
Presents a logically arranged
sequence of pure hues.
A range of colors generated by
mixing three beams of light.
The 3 beams combined produce
white light and are called
primary colors (red, green, and
blue).
Isaac Newton developed the first
color wheel in 1666.
Since then artists have studied
numerous variations of this
concept.

9. Color Harmony
How color behaves
in relation to other
colors is a complex
area of color theory.

11. Cyan
Subtracting light (black)
Magenta
Yellow
K-BlacK

12. Red
Green
Blue
Adding light (white)

15. such as red text on a blue background,
Complements vibrate

16. Other adjacency effects…

17. Combinations
by name

18. RGB vs. CMYK
• The RGB color model is an additive model in
which red, green and blue (often used in
additive light models) are combined in various
ways to reproduce other colors.
• The name of the model and the abbreviation
"RGB" come from the three primary colors,
Red, Green and Blue. These three colors
should not be confused with the primary
pigments of red, blue and yellow, known in the
art world as "primary colors".

19. Color and CMYK
• CMYK is a subtractive color model used in color printing.
• This color model is based on mixing pigments of the
following colors in order to make other colors:
– C=cyan
– M=magenta
– Y=yellow
– K=key (black).
• The mixture of ideal CMY colors is subtractive (cyan,
magenta, and yellow printed together on white result in
black). CMYK works through light absorption. The colors
that are seen are from the part of light that is not
absorbed. In CMYK, magenta plus yellow produces red,
magenta plus cyan makes blue and cyan plus yellow
generates green.