Build a Small Color Palette
Lesson 3 of 6 · Beginner · 7 min
What you will make
A five-color palette and a flat-color slime with a readable face.
Lesson checklist
Compare your own work with these checkpoints. Check each one when your result is ready.
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Resume your silhouette, add the body color and two eyes, and keep the shadow and highlight colors ready for the next lesson.
Open a 16 × 16 practice canvas with lesson examples and onion skin enabled. Your work saves automatically to My projects.
Starter files and backup import
Follow the steps
Give every color a job, from the outline to the brightest highlight.
Start with: Your connected silhouette from lesson two, or the silhouette practice file.
- 1
Read the five color roles
The palette below runs from dark outline to shadow, body, highlight and eye white. Compare how light each one looks. The body and shadow must stay visibly different even at a small size.
Five swatches with five distinct jobs.
- 2
Color inside the contour
Choose the body green and paint the interior with the pencil, leaving a one-pixel dark rim. The silhouette is solid, so filling it immediately would recolor the outline too. Once you have separated the interior, use fill on the remaining enclosed area.
A flat green body inside the original outline.
- 3
Add a tiny face
Draw two small white eye clusters with a dark pupil in each. Keep the eyes level, separated by a few body pixels, and comfortably inside the contour. Check the face at a small zoom before adding more detail.
Two readable eyes without changing the silhouette.
- 4
Keep the palette small
Try a different body color if you like, but choose a matching shadow and highlight as a group. The Palette Generator can help you explore options; return to your course project to apply the colors you chose.
A deliberate palette, ready for the shading lesson.
See the technique
One-color silhouette
A small palette with a purpose
Learning notes and references
- Separate outline, shadow, body, highlight and eye colors.
- Use clear lightness differences instead of collecting similar greens.
- Apply flat color while keeping the contour intact.