Many of you know about our COLOURlovers iPhone App - ColorSchemer Touch, but do you know all you can do with it? I wanted to do a quick highlight of all it's features, so let's get down to it!

At this point in development, ColorSchemer Touch allows you to do the following:

Peruse COLOURlovers current Palette Creations... tapping once on a palette will bring you to the Palette information.

Palette Information includes author, loves, views, comments, rank and when it was created along with the colors used.

Full Screen - To get a bigger and more beautiful show all this palette has to offer, just tap on it (again in the information screen) and it will expand full screen. WOW!

Color information includes the COLOURlovers original titles as the default display.

Just tap once over the color area to display the Hex Values for each color, tap again to see the RGB values and another tap brings you back to the original titles.

Creating Palettes in So Many Ways!

There are so many cool tools for creating your own palettes!

• - Use the standard color wheel
• - Play around with LiveSchemes (which may need it's very own post to cover how cool it is)
• - Use PhotoSchemer to grab colors from photos you have on your iPhone (or take a new photo).
• - Or use the Spectrum

And Yes, you can make palettes with varying widths!

When you're done making a palette, why not share it?!

I'll end with answering some questions that might or have already come up...

• - Yes, we're hoping to develop an Android version at some point in the future.
  
• - Yes, eventually it will have more COLOURlovers site features on it (such as perusing patterns!).

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The Grand Giveaway!

WeI'd like to give away FIVE copies of ColorSchemer Touch! Tell us how you would use the app if you had a copy and how much you dearly want it. :)

If you already own it, please feel free to let us know how you use it!

You have until Friday, July 22nd, 2011. Entries will stop at 1pm (USA PST).

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Palettes used in this tutorial:

Patterns are way easier to make than you may think, you just have to learn the tricks. That's where I come in. It seems like the pattern world is real hush hush about their techniques and the tools out there are nothing short of awful - besides the COLOURlovers Seamless Pattern Maker and my own resources at madpattern.com. In this Educational Series I'll be helping you understand the different types of patterns. Let's first start with getting you Lovers up to speed on some of the universal laws of patterns.

Pattern Types

 Pattern examples A, B, C, D (P1, P4, P6M, P3M1)

It is mathematically proven that there are only 17 different types of pattern symmetries. this is a surprisingly nice and natural way to organize the patterns you see around you.

With the release of Seamless Studio BETA, there have been some fantastic creations submitted. We're pretty excited to see designs become more and more intriguing with the new features this enhancement of the original seamless pattern maker allows.

An opportunity popped up for us to showcase how you can use Seamless Studio as an amazing design tool for things outside of COLOURlovers.com. I'll be using a real-world design contest for some Nine West totes - hosted by talenthouse.

Very exciting! - We've been working hard on a much-improved desktop version of the Seamless pattern-maker called Seamless Studio. Sponsored members of the community have been helping us test the beta and now we're opening up the beta to everybody else! We'd love your thoughts and feedback on the new app.

Download the Seamless Studio Beta Here:
http://docs.colourlovers.com/seamless-studio/install

Here’s some of the stuff we think you'll love in the new Seamless Studio:
* Save and open your templates as you're working on them
* Build your own custom shape libraries
* Import external shapes
* Upload templates directly to COLOURlovers
* Preview your COLOURlovers template in color
* Create patterns with unlimited colors
* Design on custom canvas sizes

Documentation and help sections for things like "Understanding the Interface", "Document Modes", "Custom Shapes" & more can be found here: Seamless Studio Documentation & Help

Get On The Seamless Notification List: Be the first to know when the full version launches!

 

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*A Note on Importing Shapes with Seamless Studio*

With how talented our members are, it’s hard to know when they used their amazing talents to create a custom shape.. or when they imported a vector shape from another source.

It’s ok to import shapes from other creators when you have the appropriate permissions to do so. Please do not upload pattern templates that include imported shapes / images that are copyrighted. If you use shapes that are licensed with a creative common license, please link the source in the description. Unattributed pattern templates that include copyrighted content will be removed.

*How To Help Us Beta Test*

Once you've had a chance to play with the app, we'd love to hear your thoughts and feedback.

Just copy and paste the text below into a love note to COLOURlover or email to love@colourlovers.com and send it along with your thoughts:

=======================================
Seamless Studio Beta Feedback
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Your name:

Your occupation:

Operating Systems tested:

Seamless Studio Feedback:
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* Describe any problems encountered during installation:

* Describe your initial impressions of Seamless Studio:

* What features/tools, if any, did you find to be confusing or difficult to use?

* What new features do you like most about Seamless Studio?

* What do you think could be improved?

* Describe any problems or bugs encountered while testing Seamless Studio:

* Would you recommend Seamless Studio to a friend? Why or why not?

* What are the first 3 words that pop into your head when you think of Seamless Studio?

* How often do you use Seamless Studio?

* What other software programs do you use on a regular basis?

* Please describe any additional comments regarding Seamless Studio:

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What an amazing opportunity for you! One of our great partners, Spoonflower.com is joining forces with Michael Miller Fabrics to find their next license designer for the Michael Miller Fabrics' line. This is an opportunity of a lifetime! Check the full details on projectselvage.com. CONTEST ENDS MARCH 24th

There will be 10 finalists not to mention an ultimate WINNER. Finalists get some great goodies!

• * $100 Spoonflower Credit
• * 10-yards of Michael Miller Fabric (chosen by finalist)

While you might be sitting there thinking, well I don't have design software at my fingertips, actually, you do...and for free to boot. If you don't already know about it, COLOURlovers.com has it's very own Seamless Pattern maker on hand, on site. Just go to Create > Pattern > Design a Pattern (see below image).

While you are probably going to find it a tough competition if you've never used this type of design tool before, this is an opportunity for COLOURlovers who already create some pretty fantastic work with this tool to utilize their talents and maybe win big. Do make sure you read the rules to enter throughly.

We would love to see any design you submit, so please by all means post it in the comments. Good Luck!

If you don't plan on submitting anything, please feel free to post your own Michael Miller inspirations related to the contest.

 

 

We've come a long way since industrialization and Mr. Ford's assembly line that made the first affordable automobile giving everyone the opportunity to buy a car in "any color as long as it's black." While the reality was that Mr.Ford's Model T first came in grey, green, and red, his stated "only black" policy finally came into effect in 1913. At the time, he was only concerned with the time and cost to produce each vehicle, and black paint was cheap and durable. Today, the same manufacturing ideals and process are still used but we've moved into a world of color and customization.

One of the great examples of color customization is the sneaker. For years it has been possible to apply your favorite colors and design sense to a pair of shoes. This type of flexible manufacturing will continue to develop and we expect to see this kind of customization applied to many other product categories in the future.

Another way to cover your color loving customers is to add a color product search to help them sort through the increasing number of color options. According to Alon Atsmon, the CEO of Picitup, "47% of the top 100 online retailers offer color search, only 26% of those ranked 401-500 deploy it," but from handmade indie sellers, to sporting goods, to home interiors, many companies have already integrated a color search. And now the color search technology is catching up with this new demand, or at least one company is trying to spread color search to the masses:

Picolor

Picitup process your stream of images, carefully, separates the main object from its background and accurately extracts its color. Later on once a user clicks on the color palette; only products of the selected color would be presented.

Pay homage to Color Master Gene Davis and join the color experimentation with the Color Barcode Multiblend Generator created by sero* (codename: cuttlefish).

I've been tinkering with the 99 palette generator for the last several months, and it's ready for a v2 release. It now supports widths, hue options, any number of palettes (1-99), and an offset parameter so we can narrow into any set of palettes we want. Think of it as a timeline, the offset is how many palettes back from present time you want to go.

Here is a gallery of some of the most beautiful pieces I've found so far. If you find a beautiful set, please post a link here. I know there are tons of beautiful multiblends and compositions out there waiting.  Cheers, sero*

Challenge

Started by Phoenixfire

Get Involved

Submit a palette for everyone else to make patterns from.

Seamless Tip

By ycc2106

Forum Post

HOW TO QUICKLY COMBINE PATTERN + PALETTE
For example let's combine the palette and pattern below

First of all you need to have your browser's address bar visible. (also called location bar or URL bar ) How? Each browser is a little different so you'll need to Google it with the name of your browser.

On the pattern page, below the pattern, click on 'create pattern' - You'll get the following URL - notice the patternID at the end

real example

On the palette page, click on 'create pattern' - You'll get the following URL with all the colors are listed in HEX code

All on one line - real example

To combine them, all you have to do is add up the 2 endings, link them with a '&' like in the example just below

All on one line - example

Once you have the palette code and pattern code in the address bar like in the above screenshot, press the keyboard [ENTER] key or the 'Go' button by the address bar to validate.

In simple, all you do is add the patternID string &patternDefinitionID=23941 (that you went to fetch earlier) at the end of the palette URL

Voilà! Simple! =)

PS: I think the pID=1273152 is for CL engine to get the palette name and add it to the description

Questions

Using COLOURlovers for Food Photogrpaphy?

I'm new to Colorlouvers. How can I use this site in my food photography work? Luv any thoughts!

You might want to check out some Japanese Hand-colored Photos then pick a palette and use those colors to color a photo. I know that's not food related but it sounds like fun to me. For food photography, I think COLOURlovers could be helpful if you ever run into a situation when you ask yourself:  "Is the color of that tomato not quite appetizing?" If ever you do, I think you could find the perfect red in the library, and add a little color life into the image.

What does everyone else think? Have any suggestions for michellee1? Let her know in the Forum.

International Color Usage?

The other day I stumbled across a graph that represented international color usage by country. But now, I seem to have lost the link. Have any of you colorlovers seen this or something like it?

Well, if you could settle for Colors of the Social World Wide Web we could help you out. An interesting subject, no doubt; a link I'm sure we would all love to see. Are we talking total usage of colors across every use of color: web, print, coloring book pages, etc? Doubt anyone has the info to graph that one out. But any international comparison of color is definitely interesting.

Has anyone seen any comparisons around?

Dribbble, "show and tell for designers, developers and other creatives," has been getting a lot of play around the web as of late. It seems everyone is trying to get a shot at an invite to this quickly developing design showcase and community. The chatter around the web seems to agree that while not much different than LogoPond, Coroloft, Behance, unmatchedstyle, or the plethora of other css design & logo galleries where you can find up-to-date inspiration and get feedback, where Dribble has really scored is–and not with their fun basketball references either,  but with their "social functionality and active community."

Sites likes these, and like our very own community here at COLOURlovers, can be a valuable resource for those looking for feedback on their recent projects, whether it be a new logo, sign, app, business card, letterhead, etc.

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If you're a lover here looking for some feedback try starting a forum post and include samples from different aspects of your color identity to give some context to those whose help you are seeking. This will allow others to give the most useful feedback and help keep your identity consistent. There is always a lover out there willing to lend a hand to those seeking assistance and they can be found on many sites across the web.

Clean design, smooth functionality and a color sorter!

There are so many great tools out there online these days that a person could power their entire business using nothing but free and low cost web apps.

One area that has seen tremendous advancement is the area of online applications geared towards helping people do all things related to graphic design. For some, the days of buying software suites that cost more than the most robust desktop computer may be coming to an end.

Below is a list of some of the most popular online offerings that address design, illustration and editing, including crowdsourcing of custom design.