New Adobe Kuler is cool

So I know I teased about it yesterday, but tease no more -- it's here and out in the open.

Adobe kuler is a Flash-based app and runs in your browser. It's actually based on Flash 9 and ActionScript 3, so you'll need to download the latest Flash Player to use it (you'll be prompted to do so when you enter the site, if necessary). Kuler is a project of Adobe Labs (meaning that technically, it's in beta form), but most importantly, it's fun, free, and fabulous.

Some of you know that I consider myself "challenged" in the area of color. While I've found some sites in the past that can help me find some good colors to use in a project (ColorBlender, ColourLovers, etc) I've never really gotten everything that I need. And I think Adobe has hit the mark with kuler.

First and foremost, Kuler is an online community based around the use of color. There are links that talk about color theory, events, exhibits, etc. But through this community, you can share your own use of color with others, and benefit from other people who use color as well. That's because kuler is also a tool that you can use to explore your own colors. Use kuler to find the perfect set of colors to use for any project. The user interface is pretty cool, and allows you to quickly choose a variety of "rules" such as analogous, monochromatic, complementary, etc. You can view HSV, RGB, CMYK, LAB, and HEX values of your colors, and best of all, you can click one button to export your colors as an Adobe Swatch Exchange (.ASE) file, which you can import directly into Illustrator, Photoshop, or InDesign. Nice, eh?



But that's just the small part. Since kuler is an online community, you can publish your colors so that others can see and use them. And you can rate the color palettes that people choose just like you can rate your own songs in iTunes. That means you can quickly see what the most popular colors are, which ones are rated the highest, or which ones have been recently added. Now to me -- one who doesn't know much about colors -- I think it's pretty cool that I can find some nice colors to use that others have given a good rating to. Of course, you also have a "my kuler" section, which allows you to manage your own private colors as well.

So what are you waiting for? Go give it a try -- I'm already having way too much fun with it :)

You can find Adobe kuler at http://kuler.adobe.com.

Oh, by the way, I think one of the coolest things about kuler is that it isn't an application that you buy -- which if you think about it, is something Adobe hasn't done before. If this is a new direction that Adobe is heading in (and I have my reasons to believe that is so), I think this is just the first of many cool diyctools that we might see from Adobe in the future.

And the first person who publishes a "mordy" palette of colors on kuler gets to choose a topic for the next episode of Rubber Cement!