Color Explorer is a platform for finding color inspiration and providing color-matching tools. Here you can discover, understand, and choose colors from different dimensions in an intuitive way. The site’s main content is divided into four parts:
📖 Table of Contents
Main Content of the Site
- Color ClassificationColors are classified by season, mood, color, and style. You can intuitively pick the colors you like.
- Classic Color FamiliesColor families are divided into traditional culture families, natural environment families, and distinctive art families. You can browse the colors of each family and draw matching inspiration from them.
- Color ToolboxThis section mainly provides commonly used color-related online tools, including the Color Unit Converter, the Image Color Extractor, the Multi-Color Mixer, the Gradient Generator, and the Color Picker.
- Study CenterWe share updates about the site and knowledge related to color.
Intuitive Color Classification
There are generally two ways to decide on a color: one is an intuitive choice, and the other is a scientific one. The two are not mutually exclusive; in practice, a more reasonable approach is to first narrow things down intuitively and then verify them scientifically.
If you want to know the colors of spring, summer, autumn, or winter; or if you want to know the colors that represent different emotions; or if you want to know the colors of certain distinctive styles, then you can find them under Color Classification. Of course, such classification is somewhat subjective, so we only hope to offer a bit of color inspiration to people with different needs. More intuitive categories will be added to the site in the future.
In Color Classification, each category result contains 8 color cards, and each color card shows four color combinations. These four colors can be seen as painting a scene with color; most are combinations of "adjacent hues + low saturation," and they all follow the rule of "low conflict, high harmony." So if you have a hard time choosing colors, you can find a little inspiration here.
Classic Color Family Selection
The primary color families are limited. From a scientific point of view there are three: the additive primaries of light are red, green, and blue, while the subtractive primaries of pigment are cyan, magenta, and yellow. Visually, in everyday terms, there are six primary color families (red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple), which serve as the basic colors that humans can easily distinguish. Although the primary families are limited, the colors obtained by mixing them in certain proportions are infinite.
In this infinite universe of color, both human activity and the natural world have produced a group of color families with cultural and historical character and natural attributes. In Classic Color Families, this site divides these families into three kinds: traditional culture families, natural environment families, and families with a distinctive artistic character.
As the name suggests, traditional culture families are related to traditional culture. Different countries and cultures have developed unique understandings of color through their work and production. For example, Chinese Traditional Colors hold a view that the five colors correspond to the five elements, with each color corresponding to one of the natural five elements. This is no longer a simple classification of color; it involves color, natural elements, and philosophical thought. For example, Japanese Traditional Colors take the four seasons of nature and scenes of daily life as their base, and are characterized as "light, translucent, and elegant."
As for natural environment families, this site currently has only plant colors, mineral colors, and astronomical colors, and more will be added later. The last kind is the distinctive art family. This site currently includes Rembrandt Colors, Baroque Art Colors, Morandi Colors, and Miyazaki Colors. Most of these families originate from artists’ creative styles, and each has fairly clear labels. For example: Rembrandt colors are heavy and thick, like old film; Baroque art colors are rich and ornate; Morandi colors are soft and serene; Miyazaki colors are fresh and warm.
Convenient Online Color Tools
In addition to classifying colors, this site also provides some free online tools. In the Color Toolbox, you can find a variety of practical tools:
- Color Unit Converter
If you want to know how to convert between the color models RGB, Hex, HSL, HSV, and CMYK, you can use this tool.
- Image Color Picker
If you want to know the color at a certain spot in an image, you can use this tool. Just upload the image and point your mouse at a position on it to get the color there, and we will also compute other colors of the target color to make selecting and matching easier.
- Color Palette
If you want to test the result of mixing two colors, you can use this tool. We will also compute the various transition colors of the final mixed color.
- Gradient Generator
If you want to create a gradient, you can use this tool, which supports gradients of up to 5 colors.