Colour in branding

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Accent colour

Lesson 5 of 11 in Colour in branding.

60-30-10 Color Rule · Jesse Showalter
Lesson

An accent works by scarcity. It is the colour that appears on perhaps two per cent of a page and is therefore the first thing seen, and the moment it appears on twenty per cent it stops being an accent and becomes a second primary.

primary · almost everythingsecondary · accents andstatesextended · charts and edgecasesif every tier gets equal space on the page, none of them is primary
A primary pair, a secondary set and an extended range, in the proportions each is used.
An ink drawing of a city square crowd seen from above twice, on the left with one person in a red coat among grey coats, on the right with many red coats scattered through the crowd.
In a crowd of grey coats, one red coat is seen first. When a fifth of the crowd wears red, no single coat stands out, and that is how an accent stops working.
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  1. Question 1, locked

    Why is "use the accent sparingly" weaker than "no more than five per cent of any surface"?

    • A number is something somebody can check, and sparingly gets read generously until the accent is everywhere
    • Percentages are the only way to specify a colour for dark mode
    • Sparingly has no meaning in print, only on screen
    • A stated ceiling is required before a colour can be registered
  2. Question 2, locked

    Which of these words means this? “A colour used rarely and deliberately, to draw the eye to one thing.”

    • Coverage
    • Colour alone
    • Accent
    • Extended palette
  3. Question 3, locked

    Which of these words means this? “The percentage of a surface a colour occupies. What makes an accent an accent.”

    • Metamerism
    • Coated and uncoated
    • Coverage
    • Ratio

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