Traditional complementary palettes in scenery - now with orange/blue!

[ThreeOhFour]

Hi fellow AGSers!

I wrote some blog posts about adventure game art, this time examining the use of traditional complementary palettes in scenery!

Red-green!

Yellow-purple! 

Orange-blue!   

[cat]

I'm glad you started blogging again and I like your way of analysing art.

[ThreeOhFour]

Thanks cat!

[selmiak]

the lesser known brother of blue orange. Purple instead of red also works
I love how scrolling through the post turns the images from green to more and more red. Okay the first and last screen don't quite fit that but it's fun. Will read later

[ThreeOhFour]

Yep, I've made sure I include some blueish greens and some yellowish ones, and some orangey reds and some purply ones!

I plan on covering the other complementary colour schemes soon!

[Misj']

I really like this presentation of the subject on Blender Guru's  youtube channel. Starting at 11:24 he talks about complementary colour-schemes.

I also agree with him, that images work best when there's a clear dominant and recessive colour. I tend to feel - especially with red-green - that the more equally they are used, the more tension there is in the piece...with two opposing colours competing for your attention. I think your Conquest of the Long Bow suffers a bit from that, while Gabriel Knight and Beneath a Steel Sky have a much more cohesive feel. Of course that can also be due to technical (palette) limitations.

Nice job on the examples. They clearly show the effect and different usages.

[ThreeOhFour]

Yep, I definitely agree that using two opposing colours equally stops the feeling of a "feature" colour, and weakens the usage a great deal.

Cool video by Blender Guru, I like his stuff.

I've done another post, now with yellow and purple! Check the top post for details!

First page updated with orange-blue examples!