Art of the Color Palette in Articulate 360

Do you know what Peach Fuzz is? It’s the name of a color. And not just any color, but it is Pantone’s Color of the Year for 2024! Pantone’s Executive Director explains how and why Peach Fuzz was chosen on the company’s website, using elaborate prose:

“In seeking a hue that echoes our innate yearning for closeness and connection, we chose a color radiant with warmth and modern elegance. A shade that resonates with compassion, offers a tactile embrace, and effortlessly bridges the youthful with the timeless.”

— Leatrice Eiseman, Executive Director of Pantone Color Institute

The Articualte 360 e-learning design community has issued a challenge to create a color palette with peach fuzz and then use it in instructional design. As a fan of both art and instructional design, I enthusiastically welcome this task. Before getting into the specifics of using e-learning software, it’s important to understand how to create a color palette in general.

The most spartan color palette uses a single color and makes brighter and darker variations of it. The lighter differences are known as tints. The darker variants are known as shades. A tint is a color that has some white added to it. A shade of a color is a color that has some black added to it. Artists typically would do this by hand, mixing the paints with a little metal spatula on a flat surface, not coincidentally, also called a palette. There is a more intricate definition of a palette, though, one in which the tints and shades with other color hues will appear attractive when contrasted. Fortunately, the good people at Pantone provided multiple such palettes for us in the year’s color, Peach Fuzz. I will specifically be using the Libations palette.

Creating a new theme in Articulate 360 involves sixteen color choices. Since the Libations palette only has seven colors, I made seven changes to the create-a-new-theme template and left the rest as is. The changes are: Text/Background Light 2 is Almond Peach, Text/Background Dark 2 now is Grapeade, Quiz Incorrect changed to Marsala, Accent 1 features Branded Apricot, Accent 2 carries the color of the year Peach Fuzz, Accent 3 is Almondine, and Accent 4 is Sauternene.

Let’s see my application of the Libations theme for one slide in the instructional course I am preparing on quadratic equations.

Do you like the way the slide looks? Do you prefer a different palette? Feel free to leave your comments. Now if you excuse me, I am going to find some pumpkin pie!