ColoRotate is a plug-in for Adobe Photoshop that allows you to see and edit your colors in three dimensions. By viewing them in 3D, you can more easily see how colors relate to each other giving you a better feel for putting together palettes and then edit them. ColoRotate gives you the ability to edit your foreground and background colors as well as creating adding to your color swatches.
ColoRotate is fully compatible with both Mac and Windows and requires Photoshop CS4 or later to run. By using its 3D mode, you get a more dynamic method for looking at colors within Photoshop. Through the use of a cone-shaped diamond you can select a color, or a grouping of colors, just by rotating through the diamond.
With ColoRotate there are four main editing modes. The 3D view, a slider view, a details panel, and a browser view. The main view is based on HSL color model. Most people who work with Photoshop are familiar with the traditional RGB and CMYK color models. Those who have been around for a while are also familiar with the LAB model as well.
In the Hue/Saturation/Lightness (HSL) model, the saturation and lightness components span the entire range of values, and as such, contain all the hues at different levels of saturation along its horizontal plane and with variant intensity along its vertical plane. That means that you can position colors on opposite edges of the diamond to correspond to complementary colors. Or you can arrange the colors so their hues are triangularly positioned relative to each other for a triadic color scheme. All of this provides a more intuitive way to analyze color.
Using ColoRotate you can use the color picker mode or you can use the palette mode. Color Picker mode lets you edit the foreground/background color styles, contrast ratio, and other color adjustments. The palette mode gives you the ability to choose many colors simultaneously. It is from this view that you can also copy your colors to your Photoshop swatches palette.
You can edit in 3D slices such that you can drag through the diamond along planes. There are three types of slices: hue, tint, and blend. The hue mode lets you can choose different colors by dragging and moving the small circles around the horizontal cone surface.
The tint mode a translucent triangle shape is visible. It marks the boundary between the outer colors and your selected colors. You cannot choose colors from outside the triangle. To change these colors you will have to switch modes and return to edit the colors.
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