“Color helps to express light, not the physical phenomenon, but the only light that really exists, that in the artist’s brain.” – Henri Matisse
Color and its manifold applications, infinite variations, and diverse visual representations, has captured the imagination of humankind since the dawn of time. The phenomenon found expression through the agency of artifacts such as cave art, sketches, paintings executed on canvas, pigmentation applied to cloth and textiles, illustrated text, medieval manuscripts, children’s playthings, etc. In recent times, color finds an emphatic, defined, and graded application in visual media such as advertisements, brochures, flyers, and pamphlets, as also in school uniforms, the ceremonial livery of soldiers, works of art, watch faces, various forms of apparel, digital creations, sculpture, etc. The importance of color extends to the design and content of illustrations and diagrams such as flowcharts and modern blueprints. In such applications, the use of color empowers designers to create different lines of instruction, trigger visual effects, bucket clusters of information, guide the attentions of readers and reviewers, improve user comprehension, and relieve the tedium generated by design motifs dominated by black and white palettes.
The use of color allows designers of flowcharts to generate visual serenity inside a modern illustration. Creative professionals can underline the importance of color by deploying blue and green hues that help guide the flow of meaning inside a flowchart. In this context, color acts as a reinforcement that elevates meaning and drives smoother comprehension in the minds of readers and reviewers. For instance, designers of a mobile application can devise colored panels inside flowcharts as part of planning and design stages. This tactic indicates clusters of activity (that power specific functions of said application) find depiction in hues of different primary colors. The illustration, therefore, emerges as a visual image that encodes the ability to organize information in the untrained eyes of lay readers or reviewers. The tactic could subsequently spur designers to refine key mechanisms that power the app’s operation, therefore allowing a sophisticated digital product to establish a presence in the digital domain.
Designers and brand strategists could join forces to devise tactics that spotlight the importance of color in brand communication. These individuals could explore combinations of color to frame images that emanate a definitive brand image. For instance, a news channel that broadcasts different views, opinions, narratives, and perspectives could spotlight its credo through diverse colors embedded in its brand logo. A seller of low-cost products could deploy contrasting colors such as black and yellow to emphasize its business rationale. In a similar vein, a brand that sells aerated beverages could formulate proprietary business signage using colors that excite the imagination and invite users to sample the advertised product. These tactics spotlight the importance of color in framing and projecting non-verbal messages in commercial landscapes. Flowcharts, when deployed and leveraged for such purpose, could explore and examine the use, impact, and reactions conveyed by various colors and the emotions associated with each hue.
A certain analytical standpoint propounds that the varying intensity of tasks (inside a project) must find adequate representation in a flowchart-based illustration. Project managers could harness concepts that hinge on the importance of color to indicate intensity levels inside a schematic. For instance, a civil construction project when outlined in a flowchart could depict seams and veins of color to denote timelines and the corresponding intensity of effort required to attain the same. The combination of time and color allows relevant personnel to assess the (human and budgetary) resources required to complete phases of the project, as also the extent of tolerances built into sections of the illustration. We could view such devices as a prime element of expert planning designed to deliver quality outcomes within defined timeframes. In addition, colored sections allow managers and supervisors to assess the development of projects in real time and focus attention on the proverbial way forward. This instance clearly demonstrates the importance of color as a tool that assists certain aspects of human achievement.
Stock colors, when applied to a digital diagram, can enliven the visual representation of the form and contents of a modern flowchart. This strategy is premised on the use of a light, uniform monochrome background for each illustration. In line with this, designers could deploy various hues of blue, tangerine, turquoise, magenta, yellow, and green to create the diagram. The importance of color gains significance when the various elements (stages and sub-stages) spotlight and project the contents, thereby allowing the illustration to fulfil its primary objective. In addition to the above, designers could use a contrast color to outline each stage, thereby enriching the image from a visual perspective. An interesting variation to this tactic emerges when dark colors populate the central stages in an illustration, while lighter hues dignify the stages and sub-stages that emanate from the primary.
Business enterprises that seek to re-organize or freshly assess their operational priorities could deploy colors to code key actions designed inside a flowchart illustration. Such a stance allows the organization to formulate and spotlight remedial measures, elevate the quality of customer service, initiate re-training sessions for frontline employees, mark the locations of key interventions, reduce the costs of operations, and introduce the benefits of modern automation into legacy business processes. The importance of color in such an enterprise cannot be overstated. The use of colors to encode such actions on a blueprint allows stewards of the organization to shed light on the actions that will overhaul the business and position it for enhanced profitability. In addition, this stance allows the workforce to remain on the proverbial same page, thereby creating significant momentum toward the avowed mission. The rank importance of color in such initiatives is reinforced when we consider the long-term impact of this design strategy on the ongoing evolution of the sponsor organization.
Online design tools can help creative professionals implement a range of theme colors inside digital flowcharts. In line with this assertion, designers can select theme colors for use in different sections of a flowchart. They gain significant creative license from the tints and variations of colors packaged into the tool. Further, this strategy gains credence when designers work on flowcharts that stretch over multiple stages in the service of depicting complex, extended processes, plans, or detailed blueprints. The importance of color in this context gains added utility, because the application of theme colors ensures continuity in the eyes of readers and reviewers. Further, any changes in the color scheme, where necessary, can undergo implementation without hesitation or concerns regarding the fidelity of subsequent representations. We must also appreciate the fact the disciplined use of colors imparts a certain value to flowcharts when these are digitally archived and equipped for retrieval in the future.
Colors remain an instrument of choice when designers seek to add meaning, generate momentum, and boost context in the contents of inter-connected diagrams. The scope of using colors remains limited only by the designer’s imagination. In addition, colors can enable creators to initiate a dialogue with readers, express viewpoints through their positioning inside flowcharts, and generate a grammar that helps interpret meaning ensconced in the contents of such illustrations. Digital technologies serve to promote the exploration of colors in various contexts, and empower designers to experiment with the applications of modern colors.
