So you've got a business. Nice, you're off to a good start. Now your business needs colors for things like your website, business cards, and custom branded stress balls that you give out at trade shows even though you know everyone just throws them away.
In this post, I'm going to explain how to generate a color scheme using a free tool called Coolers.
First, if you're not already familiar with my approach to these things, you should understand that I'm just focused on getting you to the point where your designs are good enough. You probably have more important things to worry about than colors, so we're just going to cover enough info for you to get a good enough color scheme, and then you can move on with your life.
Using Coolers to generate your color scheme
There are a lot of different tools to help you generate a color palette, but I think the best one is Coolers.co. It's a bit tricky to explain how this works in writing, so I made this video explaining it:
What are those weird "hex" color codes?
If you watched the video above, you might be wondering what the "hex" color codes are. The simple version is that hex (or hexadecimal) is a way to represent any color using a six digit code. Once you have your color scheme picked, you'll need to know the hex codes so you can share the colors in the future. For example, if you need to design a logo, you might want to make sure the logo uses the exact same hex code as your color scheme so the colors match.
If you're a nerd and want to learn about the math behind hex, you can read more here, but for everyone else, watch this video for a simpler explanation that doesn't involve math:
The other color code you should understand: HSL
We've already cover all the essentials when it comes to your business's color scheme, but if you find color interesting and want an advance trick, let's talk about another color format: HSL.