It is pretty safe to say color plays a vital role in powder coating, we powder coat for durability purposes as well, but no matter what the reason for powder coating is, it still always comes down to the crucial decision of what color are you going to use to complete the project? Or what color best matches what the customer is looking for? Color is without a doubt one of the biggest decisions made when powder coating, so it is important to understand all the aspects and considerations taken into account when choosing any shade.
To understand color to its fullest potential, it is beneficial to learn the basics of color theory. Color theory is generally the study of color shades and their interactions as well as effects on each other, etc. The first person to document their color theory was actually Aristotle. He began his studies by examining light and deduced that all colors were created from black and white. He also incorporated the belief that the four natural elements air, water, earth and fire mixed in with black and white to create certain colors. An example of this would be water mixing with both black light or white light to create different shades of blue. The same goes for fire, he believed fire red and orange derived from this natural element.
It wasn't until centuries later that Isaac Newton proposed a new color theory that became largely accepted due to its deeper study into color. Newton believed that white light was actually made from several color shades. He took a beam of white light and cut it in half, wrapping it into a circle. Under a microscope it was filled with a kaleidoscope of colors and thus the first true color wheel was born. This also brought to light, no pun intended, the shades red, green and blue becoming known as the primary colors. When Newton was experimenting with mirrors, he found that it ultimately came down to those three colors to create white light.
When looking at a color wheel, there are multiple different schemes or groupings of color that are found within the wheel. All schemes consist of multiple colors that are considered to pair well together in a certain way based off their positions from each other within the color wheel. One of the more popular known schemes is complimentary colors. Complimentary colors are colors found opposite of each other on the wheel, like orange and blue. If you want a certain color to pop, it is best to use the complimentary color around it. Red and green are another example of complimentary colors. Makeup artists always advise that if people want to make their blue eyes look even bluer, use shades of orange, warm brown and gold. People with green eyes are advised to use shades of red and cranberry to make their green eyes appear greener. This is all because of the color wheel and the complimentary color scheme!
Another well known scheme is the monochromatic scheme. This is when you look at one color on the wheel and its various shades beneath that usually get lighter. It's the exact same concept as when looking at a paint swatch you'd get from the store. Usually, they'll have a swatch that has four or five different shades on it starting with the darkest shade and then getting lighter or vice versa, all the same shade just different levels of white or black added to the paint to create darker or lighter versions of the beginning shade. These are just two of the various schemes that exist. Some of the more interesting and lesser-known schemes include split complimentary, square and tetrad.
Color theory can come in handy when powder coating and exercising creative color design. Whether it is based off want or necessity, it is always beneficial to know how colors pair together. An example of this happened a few weeks ago with one of our customers who called in needing advice. They had started a piece in a color that was discontinued and didn't have enough of the discontinued powder to finish the rest of the project. After not being able to find any close matches, we had to get creative and think about how we could navigate this to move forward. Ultimately we came up with the idea of what if they paired the colors complimentary color with it and make it a two-tone design? The customer loved this idea and now has a visually pleasing creative cool piece!
Have more questions regarding color theory? Call us at 615-776-7600! The Powder Buy The Pound team is well versed in color theory and always ready to help!