colors

[pocketaf]

how about making color to react on frequency of sound, higher frequency lighter color, lower - deeper.

[Karl DD]

how about making color to react on frequency of sound, higher frequency lighter color, lower - deeper.

Definitely!
Nice idea.

[blue_fox]

I like that idea

[NDean]

i concur!

[jherod]

personally i would love the addition of a color wheel like the one in Painter X, but above that I'd love the ability to create and save color palettes.
Having a palette associated with a file could also be used to enhance the random color function, using only colors from a palette that you've determined, not just the one you have open and are working with.

[Sigrun]

Well i love this software , it is great for first concepts , great work . wish i would know how to do such a software ....but for the color issue i think that you might like to check out alias Sketchbook it has a superbly designed workspace , i`m referring to the "space" menu and " click " menu that are great for very fast access . again beautiful concept and thank you .

[crowline]

I have been thinking about the color functionality some, and thought i'd throw out some of my ideas. Currently Alchemy gives GREAT freedom in experimenting with shapes, but I think these changes would really bring color freedom more up to speed.

I would like to see a palette panel.
I would like it to be easier to switch between prechosen (palette) colors.
I don't like the overlapping foreground/background boxes next to the transparency.
I would like more control over the color switcher module.

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I think of the palette panel kind of like this...


I made the panel vertical, but it could just as easily be horizontal. I would like big boxes for the colors. If this panel hides when not in use anyway, why not make the color areas big so they are easy and faster to click and so you can get a true sense of the color - compared to a little box.

When you click on a color it sets that color as the foreground color. perhaps a right or shift/control-click allows you to edit the color with a color-chooser dialog.

The import button allows importing palette files, like gimp/photoshop. and it would be AWESOME... SERIOUSLY! to be able to import palettes from colourlovers.com, either randomly, or randomly but with a specified color or keyword as in the colourlovers search. Would maybe be nice to be able to choose whether the palette that is being imported is appended to the current palette or replaces it.

The + button adds the current foreground color to the palette. The panel grows to accommodate the new color.

The X button turns the cursor to an X and when a color box is clicked it removes that color from the palette.

and actually The + and X buttons maybe shouldnt be colored... the color isnt needed, and the red and green I used is kind of distracting to have next to the palette colors.

I would like a right mouse click on the canvas to switch between colors in the palette, like in mypaint. With the most recently used color (that isnt the current color) as the first selected. This would allow very quick switching between two colors, and quick access to all colors in the palette.

Here is right-click color switching in mypaint.




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I would like to see the "background" color box get removed, and have the background color be specified elsewhere, like in a menu entry or perhaps by a right or shift/control click on the foreground color box. With the current little overlapping boxes i am always accidentally clicking on the wrong box, one of my biggest frustrations with the program. Color switching can be handeled by the palette and right-click. This would leave just the foreground color and transparency in the menu panel as in this image. Clicking on the foreground (or a little arrow) would bring up the color chooser dialog like it does now. As mentioned before one would choose their color here, then click on the Plus button in the palette to add that color to the palette.



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Lastly, it would be nice to have some finer controls over the color switcher module.

I would like to specify whether I want the module to affect any combination of hue, saturation, value, or transparency. Then have sliders for range (how far from the original color is allowed - already implemented) and step (how much of a "jump" between any consecutive color switches is allowed).

It could be cool to have a "sweep" option, where instead of random jumping around, the colors go progressively further away from the original (based on step size?) till they hit the "range" limit, then start back...

It could be cool to have a different color switcher option for just going through the palette colors.

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Well there are my ideas. Now that they are posted here maybe they will take up less space in my head

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edit 1/10/10:

I realized there is a potential confusion, regarding transparency, when switching between palette colors. do all colors in the palette share the same "global" transparency setting or do they preserve their own alpha value? I think maybe both should options should be allowed. Colors in the palette would have an alpha value which would be used unless a "lock" button next to the transparency slider was engaged. This lock button would mandate that the current transparency setting would be preserved when switching between palette colors. That would be one way of dealing with it anyway...

[Karl DD]

crowline,

Thanks for your well-considered post and taking the time out to mock up some ideas.
I think you are right, when compared to control of shapes - color is very much the 'poor cousin'.
It is definitely something we need to improve upon.
I am going to move this to the 'Planned Ideas' forum, and we will go over it more carefully when the dust settles from this release.

Karl

[Karl DD]

I just found this project here:
https://colorchooser.dev.java.net/

If you want to take a look and let me know which (if any) of these demos you could see working in Alchemy, that would be great.

[Karl DD]

Something on topic:
http://www.colorotate.org/