What is Magenta?

Color is a big part of the creative process but it can be intimidating. Do it right and it’ll look beautiful. Do it wrong and it’ll make your eyes bleed (not literally of course, but it’ll look really bad).

Today, we’re going to dive deep into the color Magenta and use it to illustrate some basic color theories and design principles. Think of it as the ABCs to using color.

Ok, you ready? Let’s do this.

Magenta is a color which can vary from deep pink to saturated purple. On color wheels of the RGB and CMY color models, it is located exactly midway between red and blue.

It is a bold unconventional color that is bound to leave an impression. Despite being a strong color, it is also a friendly and welcoming color.

So, how do we use magenta in our designs and videos?

Monochromatic = monotone + chromatic

A monotone, single colour, on a colour scale.

In simple terms, this means creating a colour scheme based on various shades and tints of one hue.  Although it lacks colour contrast, this colour scheme will produce a very clean and polished creative outcome. It also enables easy change of the darkness and lightness of your colours.

A monochromatic colour scheme is typically used for presenting information that does not need to be as attention-grabbing. It is usually used in home decor to keep the overall look uniform and pleasant to the eye. In contrast, if you’re creating videos that are intended to be eye-catching, you might want to go for a complementary colour scheme.

To spice up your videos, you can play around with 2 colours. Imagine a bottle in the middle of the colour wheel and you spin it. Those two colours at the ends of the bottle are complementary colours! A complementary colour scheme consists of colours that are opposite each other on the colour wheel.

This creates a colour palette with high contrast, which can be beneficial in videos to draw attention to certain objects with a contrasting accent colour. Using complementary colours will help to create harmony in your design.

If you’re feeling adventurous and want to add a third colour, you can consider triadic colours. Triadic colours refer to three colours that are equally placed around the colour wheel. Imagine a triangle in the middle of the colour wheel and you spin it like the Wheel of Fortune. In the case of magenta, this gives us a beautiful yellow and cyan combination.

Triad colour schemes are useful for creating high contrast in a design and making objects ‘pop’. It generates visual interest with a varied colour palette while still maintaining colour harmony. A triadic colours scheme is a great choice for accent colours to use on elements like calls-to-action buttons in your videos.

However, it can seem overwhelming if all of your colours are chosen on the same point in a line around the colour wheel. Hence, as seen in the example, we subdued the other 2 colours by choosing a softer tint.

As we learn more about colours, we have to factor in the psychological effects of colours too. We are surrounded by colours everyday — the lush greenery of Mother Nature, the clear blues in the sky. These colours in nature are calming and restorative, which is why we tend to feel relaxed when we go to a park.

Another case in point, magenta is a strong and inspiring colour. It can appear outrageous and shocking on one hand, and innovative or imaginative on the other. The colour is creativity inspired by beauty.

Some key colour meaning and symbolism:

• Black — associated with elegant, formal, powerful things;
• White — signifies light, purity, cleanness;
• Red — is assertive, strong, determined;
• Yellow — means joyful, happy, energetic;
• Blue — conveys trust, wisdom, calm;
• Green — symbolizes freshness, environmental significance, relaxation.

When choosing colours, it is a good idea to pick colours that are in line with your company’s branding (e. g. company’s logo colour or the merchandise that is being sold). This allows you to easily determine the main colour and its complementary colours using what we’ve learnt above.

Try to avoid using seasonal colour schemes with strong connotations. For example, the common colours of Christmas are green, red and white. Unless it’s a Christmas themed video, you might want to stay away from using these three colours together.

Remember to practise and have fun! No one creates their masterpiece on the first try. The more you play with colour in your videos the better you get. Save your colour scheme in your projects and it might be useful to you later.

If selecting your own colours is too complicated, feel free to use our preset colour palettes and templates! We have so many options for you to choose and get inspiration from so you don’t have to start from scratch. Simplify your video creation flow with OFFEO.

We hope you’ve learnt something new about colour today. Go forth, and paint the town red!