How does Hue Work?
JulianDracos
Mapmaker
I know that hue adjusts the color. Now for other software, the idea is that there is some numerical value assigned. Then, if you add or subtract a value, it adjusts the color. Thus, any resulting color is relative to the base color.
Assuming that CC3+ works the same, then how are we to know how to use hue? Is there some way to get the numerical value of the color so we can apply the color wheel to it? If not, are we forced to type in numbers to try?
Finally, why use hue adjustment instead of RBG matrix? What the benefits/drawbacks of using this compared to hue?
Comments
Hue is applied to the entire sheet, so there can't be a way to get the numerical value, because it isn't just a single colour you will be modifying. One part of the sheet may be green, another red, and the hue effect applies to everything so there simply isn't a fixed starting value. What you apply as hue is a modifier that will be applied to the colors on the sheet, so with a positive value, red will become more yellow, green will become more blue and so on. Look at the color wheel to anticipate the changes, the larger the value for hue, the larger the shift along the wheel. Remember, you aren't editing a single color by specifying its HSL value here, you're applying a HSL change over all the colors on the sheet. This is very different from just setting the current color in a paint program using HSL values instead of RGB.
When compared to the rgb matrix process, it's a different way of accomplishing a similar, but not identical thing. Hue operates on the HSL colorspace, and shifts colors along the color wheel. RGB martix operates on the RGB spectrum, and allows you to manipulate the RGB components of the color, and even express one color component based on the quantity of another component, something impossible to do with the HSL effect. RGB Matrix is more powerful, but also more complex, HSL can be easier to use to get more subtle tone changes.
Knowing it is HSL is useful because I can pull a wheel up for that. That gives me at least some indication of the direction the color will change.
However, I also realized that the request to have color displays so you know what the color will be cannot be done. At least if the goal is to know what the final color everything is going to be. The only way that could work is if CC3 would redraw as you adjust the hue. That would be great. However, I doubt CC3 or CC4 will have that feature.