ColorMixers.com helps you pick a color scheme/palette from a single color. There are many of these websites out there now, but this is one of the first sites (available since 2003) to offer color mixing. The website is easy to use and understand, thanks to it's clean and intuitive design and interface. There are a ton of features but enough to get the job done. I've listed the major features below.

Features

• Color scheme of 9 similar colors (8 colors and black)
• Sample preview for viewing the scheme with content
• Color slider to pick a color based on RGB values.
• Create scheme from Hex code
• Load predefined themes
• Ability to bookmark your theme
• Export your theme for Photoshop, Illustrator, or as a text file

There are also a few downloads available that you can host on your own site. One version uses PHP & MySQL, which allows for the export functions, while the other includes no PHP which allows you to run in on any webserver. The second download is basically all JavaScript.

ColorJack offers three tools for easily creating color schemes. The front page shows new and popular schemes that have been created as well as linking to the three main tools, Color Galaxy, Color Sphere, and Color Studio. Along with providing these tools, there are links to other useful sites and tools, a blog, other software created by ColorJack, and articles that have some pretty cool information.

The Front Page

The front page displays the new and popular color schemes that have been created by other users. You can hover over each of the colors to see the whole scheme that was designed. It is a little confusing to understand at first, but the white spaces are breaks in between different color schemes. So when you hover over a color, it shows you the colors to the left and right of it as well (before the next and after the previous white space) to see what the colors look like together.

Color Galaxy

Color Galaxy allows you to pick from 27 color schemes and look at the makeup of that color. Some of the color schemes include crayola, mozilla, IE, Netscape, and Windows. Once you choose a color scheme it gets loaded into a "galaxy" arrangement and you can then pick one of the colors to examine. Clicking on a color will then load information describing it's makeup on the right. Personally I like the ven diagram that gets created to show the colors mixed together.

Color Sphere

Color Sphere offers color schemes based on a number of variables. It is displayed in a color picker format on the left as well as a list format on the right. You can apply a number of rules/filters to the colors to end up with your desired color scheme. Colors can be adjusted from the sphere on the left or the list on the right and new color schemes will be created dynamically. Some of the filters available are analogous, complimentary, triadic, and tetradic. You can also choose to see all colors in the spectrum, websmart colors, or websafe colors. You are also given the ability to export the color scheme for Adobe Illustrator and Adobe Photoshop.

Color Studio

Color Studio is in my opinion the best part of the site. It offers information about a color selected as well as a palette for a color scheme. You can start with a color by entering the HEX code or picking one from a color picker. Once you have a color selected, you can start to apply filters and functions similar to those previously mentioned in the two apps above. You can also darken/lighten the color scheme, adjust the hue, saturation, and value of the colors, as well as add and remove additional colors to or from the palette. Like the Color Sphere, you can export the color scheme to Adobe Illustrator and Adobe Photoshop. You can also save it to Delicious, bookmark it in your browser, and get the direct link as a URL.

All three of these apps from ColorJack are worth checking out. If you like what they have to offer, you can check out more from their software page and read up on some color theory at their article and blog pages.

Picking the colors for your next website or logo design is not always an easy task. There are so many great looking websites out there that use some very nice colors. How do you find the color to start with as the base or add to compliment it? Thankfully for those of us that aren't as creative as we wish we were there are websites available to help us see what a color scheme would look like. Here are some of the websites available.

Adobe Kuler

This is one of the coolest color applications I've used. It allows you to register an account in order to save color schemes you create or like to easily return to them at a later time. There are recent and best lists for color schemes that have been created by others. You can create your own or pick one that someone else has made. Being able to browse the others helps in finding the right scheme for you. The app lets you control and change each of the five colors or choose one to start with and create a scheme based on rule sets (analogous, monochromatic, triad, complimentary, compound, and shades). Another cool thing about Kuler is its ability to pick a color from an uploaded picture.

Color Wizard

The Color Wizard is very similar to Adobe Kuler. It has the ability to pick many different colors and provides RGB color sliders for fine tuning. Once you pick a color, a general scheme is generated and allows you to filter based on the rule sets (monochromatic, analogous, triadic, tetradic, complimentary, and split-complimentary). You are given a scheme made up of four colors. You don't have the ability to save schemes for later, but this is still a great tool for color schemes.

Colour Scheme Chooser

This is the slowest loading application that I found but it is worth the wait. The app was originally created by SitePro Central. You have the ability to choose a color to start with based on HEX and RGB as well as providing a color picker. A scheme of seven colors is created for you based on rule sets (monochromatic, analogic, analogic+, complimentary, and split-complimentary, triadic, and double contrast).

Color Schemer

This application is available both online and as a downloadable desktop installation. It isn't as fancy looking as Adobe's but it gets the job done. You are able to pick a color to start with either by HEX or RGB code or clicking on a color and a palette will be generated based on that color. Once you have picked your base color and the palette has been created you can lighten or darken the entire palette. If you see another color in the palette that you like better you can simply click on the color and a new palette will be generated based on the new color as the base. A palette of 16 colors is created.

ColorToy 2.0

This is yet another Flash application that allows you to start with a base color and have a scheme created from that color. There aren't many bells and whistles offered but it will generate nine colors that work well together. You can use HEX or RGB to select your base color or use a random function that will pick a color for you.

What other resources do you use to pick your color scheme? Let us know in the comments.