Extracting a Color Palette from a Favorite Image

It's so fun to browse through color inspiration sites. Lots of eye candy that you can use for your projects. You can easily make your own color palette extractions from your favorite images.  Try Pictuaculous.

I started with this awesome image of a Red and Yellow Barbet from Jasenka Luksa. I love the colors and patterns of this little bird and wondered if it could translate into a cool design project.

Just upload your image and click "Get my palette."

It'll bring up some suggested colors along with their hex values to use on blogs or web development. They also give you some similar options from Kuler and ColourLovers.  If you have Adobe products, you can download a swatch file to use right in the program.

 

You can take a screenshot of the colors to paste into your image document if you want to keep the image and the palette together in one image. What if you see an image and want to capture it right then? They have a function for smart phones too, just snap the image and email it to them. You'll get the palette delivered to your mobile. Cool!

I decided to make a little 4x6 flat notecard using my inspiration image and color palette.

It's bold and colorful, just like the little bird! It'd be fun to do a project like this on a bigger scale for a print on a kids room wall. Maybe matching the color scheme of the other art or bedding in the room.