Customer Reviews

Color Harmony 2 with The Palette Picker: A Guide to Creative Color Combinations

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

While I found the book to be useful, especially in the 'classic' swatch sections, the 'trendy' area is a bit outdated, being it's six years old.

Also, you're better off buying the version without the CD. Be cautioned, the CD is old, written for Windows 3.1 and Windows 95, uses a primitive 'drag folder onto your hard drive, click file and choose program to associate with' install procedure, and uses an included, older version of Oracle Media Objects player to run...it will not work on Windows NT 4.

There's a lot of confusion about the two versions of Color Harmony 2 because the difference seems to be the CD -- both versions credit Bride M. Whelan as author; the less expensive version doesn't come with the CD (which I haven't used).

The comments on color combinations have been helpful in convincing client/coworkers -- "but this is a Professional palette!" The book's palettes can be a useful starting place.

One caveat: written in 1994, the New Trends section is a bit dated, unfortunately.

This is a very good color reference book if you're in a hurry for some attractive color combinations and suffering from mental block. It has been very handy in web page creation also.

This book is ok for the beginner, but I should have bought something more like the Designers Guide to Color Series. First Color Harmony 2 is basic art class. Second the cd rom is not what I thought it would be. I was expecting something more like a paint palette where I could create, or mix my own colors and then have the software comeup with the complementary, split-complementary, analagous combinations etc. Instead I am limited to the 106 individual programmed colors. So I was really disappointed. And didn't think it was worth the price.

This is the best book on color I have found. It is a must have for anyone who has ever been confused about matching colors and creating the right mood. Though I was already fairly confident working with color, this book helped me a great deal by letting me see a wide variety of color combinations together.

The book begins by discussing the color wheel. This includes the facets of color such as hot, cold, light, dark, pale, bright, warm and cool as well as a great explanation of all the different color schemes. It is divided into over 20 different themes including romantic, friendly, earthy, fresh, calm, traditional, professional, magical, classic, tropical and energetic. For each of these themes a set of color schemes including monochromatic, primary, complementary, split-complementary, analogous, spilt, clash and neutral is shown. A brief tips section for using the themes in graphic design, interiors and fine art is also provided. In the back of the book there is a process color conversion chart that gives the CMYK values for each of the 106 colors used. Swatches that you can cut out are included. This is very useful for graphic designers.

A very helpful and versatile CD is included with this book as well. It allows you sort by color scheme or theme. You can also pick a color and then see all the color schemes that will work with it. Each color scheme is shown in several different forms and against black, white and gray. One of a color scheme's colors can be made bigger to be used as a background to the others as well. Colors can be saved and added to custom lists and exported to popular graphics programs like Photoshop and PageMaker. The color DIC number as well as RGB and CMYK values are also given.

The program does have some minor limitations. It can only search one aspect at a time. For instance you can't search for a rich theme with yellow. Also, if you search by color or color scheme you can't find out which theme set it originally belonged too. I found it a little hard to install and use at first as well.

This book and Color Harmony Workbook are pretty much identical in content. However, this one is smaller and contains a CD while the other has tear-out swatches. Because I was more interested in decorating my home the workbook was more useful to me. For a web or graphic designer using computers a lot this version will probably be of more help. If I had to select only one color book, this one or Color Harmony Workbook would be my first choice.

I have Color Harmony 2 without the CD. It is a great book (5 stars in my opinion). Therefor I also got the one with the CD.

THE CD DOES NOT RUN ON WINDOWS XP!!!!!!

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