Monday, February 28, 2011

{CoffeeShop ColorBar}


Well, it was late Sunday night, the kids were in bed, the husband was asleep in front of the TV (he spent most of the day entertaining the kids, bless him) and I had the sudden urge to create something new. If you have been following my blog for any time
 you probably realize I am always trying new things. A reader once compared my blog to a Cat. 5 hurricane and said it had no focus.  Well, he had a point!  I started just designing actions, and now look at all of the crazy things I post on this blog. I don't know what I would do if I couldn't blog all of the stuff flying around in my head.

I am the first to admit I get overwhelmed with color choices. I do some limited designing on the side, but when it comes to picking out colors I always end up going with the same boring palettes (usually browns and blues). So to break myself out of that rut,  I make myself visit sites like Colour Lovers, hoping to get inspired to try something new. 

I have noticed images with color palettes under them all around the web, and suddenly it hit me that I needed to create my own template so that I could customize my own color palette using my own images. Heck, I could use any beautiful image out there to make a custom color palette. How many times do I look at a photo and marvel at the colors?

I played around for a few hours yesterday creating both a vertical and horizontal layered .psd file (for Photoshop and PSE) for this new project. I simple insert any image using a clipping mask. The color bars under the image are clipping masks with customizable Color Fill layers, so I just click to select each color fill layer and use the eye dropper on the image to select my favorite colors (as seen above).  After you build your color palette you can crop out the image (especially necessary if you used someone else's image for your color picking).

Just in case anyone out there is interested in the colors I selected above, I added the hex#'s.  These were the first colors I picked out of my image and I was thrilled how good they all looked together.   I mentioned my newest project on my Facebook page and asked if these layered storyboard color palette files would be of interest to anyone out there, and the response was very enthusiastic. Did I mention that I ♥ my readers and they give me a huge swollen head that is bound to explode one of these days? 

So I will be posting both image files tomorrow for free download. They won't have the hex#'s on them as seen in the image above, but you can easily add them if you want. I hope you enjoy my newest project and enjoy being your own designer.  This is a great way to pick colors for storyboards, scrapbooking, interior design, sewing/knitting, etc.  Once I put out the templates I would love if you could post some of your work on my Facebook page.

I think this is one of my favorite projects and I am so excited to share it with you.  ♥  Thank you once again for putting up with me!

18 comments:

  1. Wow, Rita, you must have read my mind! I was visiting a site called Design Seeds just a few days ago, and was thinking about how much I'd like to start including something like this with my prints. Great idea!

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  2. Oh, Designs Seeds, what a gorgeous website! Her images are stunning. See, that is someone with real artistic talent. Some create art, some make blank templates for others to create art. ;-)

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  3. Many people are commenting on my Facebook page that there are expensive programs out there to do this. Who knew you could make a simple template with clipping masks and color fill layers!

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  4. Fabulous and practical idea Rita! Sometimes you want to recapture the color mood you created in an image - what a great way to get the palette!!

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  5. Loving the new project, Rita! What a great idea!!!

    Hows Ms. Maple these days?

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  6. Hi Megan! Maple is still a handfull, but we started classes. So far one down and she was the worst pupil!!! Well, maybe I am the worst owner. ;-) She is really so sweet and wants to please, I just need to take the time to train her.

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  7. Hello! I just found your blog through a friend on Facebook. You have SO much information here it will take a while to get through all your fabulous ideas and suggestions. Thank you! Now I want to know..is this a blogger blog, and if so, how did you allow all the individual pages? Fabolous coffee mug graphic for the pages, too! You can find me at www.4pointsphotography.blogspot.com -where I try to linger a couple of times a week!

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  8. Hi Sandy! Blogger now has 10 static pages, just go to Posting, Edit Pages to find them.

    Welcome!!!

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  9. Great idea! I see something like this on the Creature Comforts blog and love it. I find it helps me find the "hidden" colors in photos. So THANK YOU in advance. :)

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  10. BUT.... I can't wait until tomorrow!!! ♥

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  11. This is terrific!
    Wow! Really wow!

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  12. Hi Rita, I did something similar when I was dyeing a warp. I used a photo of Gaillardia (blanket flowers), picked out some gorgeous golds, bright yellows, and burgundies, then painted the warp. I can't wait to try your way!

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  13. Great idea, Rita, I love these colors. But even more I love the pix of your darling boys.

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  14. Dear Rita - thank you for blowing around like a Hurricane!!!! You are a HUGE cat. 5 blessing to many people x

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  15. Thank you Rita for blowing about like a hurricane. You R a HUGE cat. 5 blessing to many people!!! x

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  16. adobe.kuler.com will select colors from a photograph for you. You just upload the photograph, then play around with it to select your colors. If you haven't used this site yet, you REALLY should. There is an extension in Photoshop (Window>Extensions>Kuler) that integrates it right in.

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  17. Thank you very much for sharing such a great idea. I love it ! It sprinkles a touch of class as a border to the photo.

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Thank you for taking the time to leave a message, I love reading them! All comments are personally moderated by me and I will post and answer them them as soon as possible.
Rita