The PxR Spriting Encyclopedia

[SassySnivy]

.:*~Color Basics~*:.
I will not go into color theory, because that is a broad enough area itself and branches out to basically all forms of art.

First of all, be adventerous: don't be afraid to create your own colors rather than play it safe and use only colors used on, for instance, official Pokemon sprites. Spriting is about trial and error: making mistakes until you get it right!


.:*~Hue-Shifting~*:.
Hue-shifting applies all three of the digital elements of a color (minus the RGB values): hue, saturation, and luminosity! However, simply referring to it as "hue-shifting" is shorter, catchier, and easier to remember.

hue-shifting is the process of shifting over the hue, saturation, and luminosity as you go up or down in your color ramp.




Ultimately, warmer colors tend to be used with higher saturation and for brighter tones, while cooler colors are used a lot with lower saturation and for darker tones. This is just a rule of thumb with hue-shifting, but there are always exceptions.

Quote from Pixel Joint:

Hue-shifting refers to having a transition of hues in a color ramp. A color ramp without hue-shifting is known as a straight ramp. In straight ramps, only the luminescence changes, while in hue-shifted ramps both hue and luminescence will (usually) change.




The first color ramp is a straight green ramp. The second image is a green ramp with hue-shifting applied. When using hue shifting, bend your highlights toward a certain color (yellow, in the example above), and move the darker colors toward a second color (I chose blue in the above example). Hue-shifting is used because straight ramps are usually boring and don't reflect the variety of hues we see in reality, and hue shifting can add subtle color contrast within a ramp.

--cure