Color Definitions

Overview

The main place for colors in CHILI is the Color list in the Styles panel. It is an editable scroll list of color entries defined by various color models like CMYK, RGB,LaB, etc.

The color list lets you create and name colors, gradients & tints and apply them to your objects from their respective settings panels. The color list works similar to paragraph

or character styles, i.e. any change you make to a color from the list affects all objects to which that color is applied. Having colors centralized in a main 'style' list also makes

it convenient to change color schemes throughout your document without having to locate and adjust each individual object. Color lists you create are associated with

the current document only.

Using the color list

The color list is located in Styles tab > Colors panel. By default the list is populated by three non-editable entries: [None], [Black] and [White].

[None] is the same as no color, for example if you set a fill color to [None], it unchecks the fill checkbox of the object, effectively removing color.

[Black] is built-in 100% process color black, defined by the CMYK model.

[White] is a built-in printing white color.

Editing colors

The Colors list panel :

Click the + and - icons in the top left to add/remove colors. When a new color is added, the Color Settings panel

shows the settings where this new color can be defined. The Color Settings located at Styles tab > Color Settings panel.

The Color Settings panel :

Name : name for the color
Filter : filter tag for the color
Editable in popup : sets if the color is editable in the popup view (see below)
Apply to snippets : makes the color available as a variable in snippets
Type : selects one of the available color models : CMYK, RGB, Lab, Spot, Gradient

Depending on which color type is chosen, different settings are available.

CMYK has four sliders, one for each color channel. C = cyan, M = magenta, Y = yellow, K = key (black)

RGB has three sliders (1) (Red, Green, Blue) by default, one for each color channel, but there are two other ways to define RGB colors : HLS (2) and Bar (3).

Click on the respective icons to access the selection modes.

RGB HLS selection : H = Hue, L = lightness, S = Saturation

Websafe colors reduces the palette to color range defined by the webbrowser

X11 standard, guaranteeing a consistent rendering of those colors on most

real world monitors and display devices.

RGB Bar selection :

RGB Bar is defined by a color hue spectrum and lightness bar.

Lab has three sliders, one for each color channel. L = lightness, a and b = opposing colors.

Lab color settings :

Spot is defined by any of the available color models, since the term determines that the color should be printed as a solid ink,

rather than acting as an actual color space.

The Spot color settings :

Spot Name : naming of the spot color (this must be defined if you would like the color to be it's own separation in PDF output)
Spot Type : select one of the color models
Tint : sets a percentage of the spot ink color

Gradient is a smooth transition of one color to another, it is defined by a
start and end color, available from the color list.

Gradient color settings :

Start color : first color of the gradient
End color : last color of the gradient
Gradient Type : linear or radial color transition
Location 1 : position in the gradient where the transition should start
Location 2 : position in the gradient where the transition should end
Angle : linear gradients can have an angle, set in degrees

Color Selection

Overview of selection options for colors:

toolbars: in the normal toolbars (main interface top & bottom), inline toolbar
text : in the character settings panel
"Preview Rectangle" vs. "Pulldown" and "Edit"

Colors can be selected in several different ways. As mentioned above the central place is the color list panel, but

there are other locations. In the main interface there are two locations where colors can be selected: for frames,

rectangles, circles, lines and shapes you can select "Fill and Border colors" from the bottom toolbar. For text

you can select colors from the toolbar at the top of the main interface. From the inline toolbar colors can be selected

for all frames, shapes and text. See screenshot below for a visual overview of the different locations.

Furthermore, for text, colors can be selected from Character Settings in :

Text tab > Character Settings panel:

Color settings are accessed by clicking on the appropriate "preview color rectangle" as seen
in the screenshots above or using the drop down menu next to it. By clicking on the color preview, a popup window appears which contains the settings for the selected color type and the same list of colors as in the Styles tab > Colors panel.
If the settings do not appear in the popup window, then check the "Editable in popup" option in the colors panel.

This is a color list when the popup is not editable :

Colors can also be selected from pulldown menu's ("New Color"), mostly found next to a preview rectangle :

When clicking on the Custom color item, an edit button appears for this color, clicking this button
creates an edit popup for this color:

As of version 3.0.1, the color "None" has a diagonal red line, this way its visually easier to distinguish it from the color "White" :

Color Restrictions

In the* environment* tab > view preferences panel > general drop down you can set restrictions on how the end-user will interact with colors and how the colors are displayed.

You can set the default color type as wel as the default for the RGB Picker.

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