Edit Colors in Illustrator: How to Read a Color Palette's Personality, by Laura Coyle Illustrator on YouTube. 5 min 15 s.
- Video length
- 5 min 15 s
- Time to do it
- 10 minutes
- Difficulty
- Easy
- Steps
- 8
What you need
Steps
Open the Swatches panel from Window > Swatches and look for a saved color group. A group appears as a folder icon holding several swatches.
Click the folder icon to select the group, then click the Edit Swatch Group button at the bottom of the panel. The Edit Colors color wheel opens.
Read the wheel before you change anything. Tightly clustered dots mean a cohesive palette, dots spread across every hue mean a wide, vibrant one.
Check for a named harmony such as split complementary. Many good palettes have no textbook name, so judge them by their shape on the wheel.
Click the link icon in the Edit Colors dialog to unlink the colors. Linked colors move together, unlinked colors can be edited one at a time.
To change a color, drag its marker around the wheel or double-click it to open the color picker and enter exact values.
Fine-tune the selected color with the sliders in the dialog, then use the add and remove controls to change how many colors the group holds.
Click OK to save your edits back to the group. To rename it, select the group and open Swatch Group Options from the Swatches panel menu.
Tips and common mistakes
Unlink the colors first if you only want to adjust one swatch, or the whole group will shift with it.
Save palettes you like as color groups so Edit Colors can map them on the wheel later.
A palette that looks muddy usually has colors bunched in one part of the wheel, so spread a marker or two further out.
Keep a copy of the original group before big edits so you can compare the old and new personalities.
Questions
What does the link icon do in Edit Colors?
It keeps the colors in the group linked so they move together on the wheel. Unlink them when you want to change one color on its own.
Can I edit a palette I imported from Adobe Color?
Yes. Save it as a color group in the Swatches panel, select the folder icon, then open Edit Colors to see it on the wheel.
Will editing the group change colors already applied to my artwork?
It changes the saved swatches in the group. Check your artboard after you click OK, and work on a copy if you need to keep the original colors.
This guide was drafted from the video's details and general task knowledge. It has not been checked against the full video. Check the video and relevant product instructions before following a procedure. Report a correction.
