let's finally settle the score on color theory you've probably been told things like up to 90
of consumers evaluate a brand or design and based on color alone and according to studies
yeah that's pretty true but there are various different problems that designers need to be
aware of when it comes to color theory and you won't want to miss out on this knowledge
pertaining to color in 1974 KW Jacobs demonstrated red to be more stimulating than green and green
more stimulating than blue according to this study a person left in a red room is constantly
stimulated with heightened awareness and elevated heart rate and in 1981 Richard cooler showed in
studies that color had a great effect on EEG readings and heart rates as well as emotional
perceptions of objects so color does have a direct physical response on our bodies and can actually
play on our emotions but here's the first very important thing you want to keep in mind as a
designer it isn't necessarily the color that's important brightness and low saturation creates a
soft feeling whereas dimness and high saturation creates a hard or strong feeling also weaker
contrast and weaker saturation conveys calmness as opposed to a stronger contrast and saturation
which convey activity it's why pastel colors are often given to baby things or are considered by
some to be calming because they lack saturation and as you can see things do start to become a
bit tricky when it comes to the use of color and color theory but only if you don't properly absorb
the content in today's video and potentially you do take some notes let's just say hypothetically
we're making a design for an insurance company now it could be a logo a brochure whatever it
is using this knowledge you might then choose one low saturation and two weak contrast these
decisions will convey a sense of calmness which is great for conveying to the target audience
that they're in safe hands and that yes they will purchase 100 Years of your finest Insurance
knowing the message or feeling you want to send out with Your Design allows you to then select
things like saturation contrast and brightness but let's go deeper with color theory even yet still
in common color theory you've probably heard this a thousand different times the color red
relates to danger but also to passion and last to blah blah blah yes to some extent this is true of
course but get this we already know that from the study mentioned earlier that red creates a
heightened sense of stimulation being stimulated like that does a few things some of those things
include changes in breathing patterns pulse blood pressure and muscle tension okay cool but where
does that even fit into graphic design so when people are at this level of stimuli they're more
likely to recall something and to form memory Loops it's like mini trauma and our brains are
designed to latch onto Trauma from a survival point of view many Brands and many designs use
red or similar colors to grab attention and to create Hard Solid memories to the audience think
of Brands like CNN or Target as example so for the UI and ux designers out there HubSpot ran
a study on the effect of switching website call to action buttons from green to red and they got
some very very conclusive results the red button outperformed the green button by 21 in terms of
Click through rate which is pretty major in the business World color theory can be fiddly and it
can be precise at times for example combining a vibrant red and green together can end up being
unpleasant to the eye but if you lighten the red to a soft pink and then make the green less
saturated and slightly darker it then becomes a decent color palette one that is immediately
memorable and Visually appealing to use there is a spanner I could throw into the works right here
culture culture plays a vital role in how people feel towards color red typically denotes love
in the US in Japan however red is associated with wrath and anger there are many different examples
of how different cultures use and feel towards color but here's yet another spanner to throw into
the works age and gender Studies have shown that women tend to prefer softer more pastel colors
whereas men prefer Bolder colors it's important to note that this is just an average and won't apply
to everyone in a group but when making designs and decisions on those designs we aim to kind of
appeal to the majority of a target audience and not just the minority this should tell you that
you absolutely must know your target audience in terms of the age gender location what they
like and dislike and what you want them to feel with your design in doing so you can then pick
colors that do actually work but not just colors the saturation the brightness the contrast and
all of that good stuff so let's quickly make one design but in two very different ways by using
what we've talked about in today's video in regard to color theory and yes I am actually a bit sick
at the moment and I probably am going to be okay by the time you watch this video but for the first
design this is something for a Chic an exclusive even upmarket fashion magazine now for this kind
of design I might want to consider that a Chic and upmarket design does not want to be loud and over
the top and that's because it's trying to appeal to a more refined and more sophisticated kind of
person so it does need to be more classy more refined and more sophisticated in terms of the
color with that in mind a muted color palette with low saturation would be a very good idea
so this base image has had its saturation lowered and it's mainly seen in grayscale but if I add in
the magazine title I've also then gone ahead and used a gray kind of color and it's not saturated
this keeps in line with my theory and we will soon see a totally different version of this design but
finally we're going to add in minor text and this does need some saturation and contrast just to
stand out and be legible but yet this design as a whole is refined it's sophisticated and it's
simple but what if we're making the same kind of design but aimed towards readers or viewers who
might be teenagers or just not into these Chic and expensive side of fashion well we can then decide
to slap on some saturated bold colors to create a kind of a loud statement and then use a title
that is also very bold over impacting we can then continue the rest of the typography in a similar
way and as you can see guys the same essential design can look very different and appeal to
two very different audiences simply by considering color and yes okay you've got me I was sneaky and
did use a different typography too but hey I'm a designer and I just can't really help myself but
yeah that's how you can consider saturation Hues brightness all that good stuff when it comes to
color theory and the audience and in the video seen on screen now I actually go into depth on
how color theory plays into logo designing so if you want to learn something really interesting
helpful about that just click the video on screen and until next time guys design your future today