Help

Palette Studio for Miniatures

Palette Studio is a free tool for miniature painters. Pick a paint or a colour, and it builds a colour scheme matched to real paints you can buy. A question or a problem? See Contact and privacy.

Start a scheme

What do Roll a scheme and ↻ (Pick a colour for me) do?

Both give you a random idea. You can undo each one with ↶ Undo (Ctrl/⌘ Z).

• Roll a scheme (the die at the start of the row of harmonies; where that row is narrow, for example on a phone, the button shows only “Roll”) picks a new harmony at random for the starting colour. The starting paint stays the same, in the same role (Main or Accent). The lightness, the colours you locked or added, and the pop accent do not change. It never picks Custom or the harmony you have now. For a neutral colour (a black, white or grey), it picks only from the schemes for neutrals: Neutral + pop, Duotone, Warm / cool and Shades.
• ↻ Pick a colour for me (under the lightness slider; beside it on a phone) gives the scheme a new random colour: a random hue and strength. For most colours, it keeps the lightness and the harmony. On black, on white, and on colours near them, every hue looks grey. So there, ↻ moves the lightness by the smallest step that lets the new colour show, and a message tells you the new lightness. On a black, white or grey colour, the scheme is one for neutrals. The new colour has a hue, so the scheme changes back to a harmony with a hue: the one you had before, or Complementary.

How do I keep a colour or a paint I already chose?

On the Recipe tab, the Secondary, Accent and Metal cards each have two controls:

• Lock colour keeps the role's target colour. When you change the harmony, roll a scheme or press ↻, the other roles change and this one stays.
• 📌 Choose pot… lets you pick the paint for the role, for example a gold you already used on the model. The tone ladder then starts from that pot. The card still shows how far the pot is from the target colour (ΔE), so you can see if it fits the scheme.

On the live palette, the pencil on a column opens the same list of paints. Its last row lets you set a custom colour. On the wheel, drag a role's node to lock that role at a new colour.

A line under the live palette lists what you hold. Select Release to let a role change again. Holds stay when you pick a new starting paint, and a shared link keeps them. The Primary role always comes from the starting paint, so you cannot hold it.

Matching and ΔE

How the matching works

For each colour in your scheme, Palette Studio finds the nearest real paint. It measures how different two colours look with ΔE 2000 (say “delta E”), a standard measure of colour difference. A lower number is a closer match.

Every match shows its ΔE and a label:

• Indistinguishable: ΔE 1 or less. You cannot see a difference.
• Excellent: ΔE 2 or less.
• Good: ΔE 3.5 or less.
• Fair: ΔE 5 or less. You can see the difference side by side.
• Loose: ΔE 10 or less.
• Poor: more than ΔE 10. It is a different colour.

The colour values for real paints are approximate. So a match is never exact, and the ΔE tells you how close it is.

Use my paints

Set it in ⋯ → Use my paints. It changes the matches in the live palette, the Recipe, the shopping list and the Accessibility tab. The Other brands tab always lists every paint.

• Off: every paint can match.
• Prefer: a paint you own counts as about ΔE 6 closer than it is. So it wins a close call, but not a clear one. The ΔE you see is the true value.
• Only: only paints you own can match, even when the match is poor.

While Prefer or Only is on, a note under the live palette says so. To use this setting, first mark the paints you own on the Shelf.

Why doesn't a match look exactly like my paint?

The colour values for real paints are approximate. Every match shows its ΔE score and a plain-language label, so you can see how close it is (see How the matching works). The paint data comes from the community dataset Arcturus5404/miniature-paints.

A paint is missing, or its colour is wrong

Tell me through the contact page. Include the brand, the paint name, and what looks wrong.

Your shelf

How do I mark my paints on a phone?

Tap a paint to mark it: owned, then on the shopping list, then not marked. To read names without marking, hold a finger on a paint for a moment, then slide it across the shelf. A label above your finger names each paint. Lift your finger to stop: this marks nothing. Hold still for longer to open the menu.

To mark many paints at once, press Select. Tap paints, or hold one and drag: every paint from that one to your finger is selected, row by row. The actions come up at the bottom: Mark owned, Add to shopping list or Clear.

To show only some kinds of paint, open Filters and turn on one or more types, such as Layer and Wash. When a search or a filter hides paints, the line under the title says how many show, with Clear filters.

Where is my shelf saved?

Only in this browser, on this device. Palette Studio has no accounts and no server, so there is no other copy. Clearing the site's data or using a private window removes it. Safari can also clear it when you do not open the site for some time. To keep your shelf safe, add the app to your Home Screen, or back it up now and then (⋯ → Back up everything).

How do I delete my shelf?

Open ⋯ → About and choose Delete my shelf and settings…. It asks first, and it lets you save a backup. Then it removes your owned marks, your shopping list, your saved schemes and your settings from this device. You cannot undo this.

Schemes

How do I keep a scheme?

Press Save on the line above the starting paint, give the scheme a name, and press Save again. It goes to Schemes, next to Studio and Shelf at the top. When you change a saved scheme, the line says Changed: Save keeps the change in it, and Save as new keeps both. Nothing is saved until you press Save. In Schemes you can open, rename, share or delete a scheme. Deleting a scheme keeps its paints on your shopping list.

Shopping and the store

How do I use my shopping list in a store?

Open the Shelf, press List, then Shopping list. The paints show in the order a store racks them: brand, then range. By project groups them by the scheme they are for. Tick a paint when it is in your basket: it is then owned. Tap it again to undo. Add a count sets how many pots you want. Print puts the list on paper.

What if the store does not have a paint?

In the Shelf's list, press Not on the rack? on the paint (on a phone, the arrows button beside its count). You see the three closest pots, each with how close it is (ΔE) and a word for that (Good, Fair…). A wash only gets washes, and a metallic only metallics. Press Use: the new pot goes on your list in its place, and if the paint was a pot in a scheme, the scheme uses the new pot too. The Recipe then says “Swapped in the store for …”, with Use the original to go back.

If the store does not carry a brand at all, switch it off under This store carries. Every paint of that brand then shows its closest pots from the other brands.

How do I get my list from my computer to my phone?

On the computer, open ⋯ → Take to the store… (or Take to the store… in the Shelf's list). Choose all your paints or one project. Scan the QR code with your phone's camera, or send the link to your phone. On the phone, the app asks before it adds the paints to the shopping list there. Paints you own on the phone stay owned. Nothing goes to a server: the list is in the link.

In the store, tick each paint as you buy it. Then press Send “bought”… above the list, and open that link on the computer. The app asks, then marks those paints owned there too. It only adds owned marks, and opening the link again changes nothing.

The first time a project without a name leaves the app, it asks for a name once. Skip keeps the automatic name (for example “Death Guard Green · triadic”). The name is part of the link you send.

Save as text in the same panel gives a plain file of the list: each paint with a [ ] box, in rack order, with no colour codes. ⋯ → Save the recipe saves the scheme on screen.

Backup and other devices

How do I move my shelf to another device?

⋯ → Back up everything here, then ⋯ → Restore… on the other device. It replaces the shelf there. To add paints from a paintRack list without replacing anything, use Import… on the Shelf.

A backup holds your owned marks, your shopping list, your saved schemes and your settings: theme, Use my paints, the tone ladder and Include Contrast. Before Restore… replaces anything, it shows what is on this device and what is in the backup, and it lets you save a backup of this shelf first.

Does it work offline?

Yes. After your first visit, the website works without a connection, and you can add it to your home screen. The iPhone and iPad app works offline from the start.

Keyboard shortcuts

Ctrl/⌘ Z

Studio: undo a palette change. Ctrl/⌘ Shift Z or Ctrl/⌘ Y redoes it.

← → ↑ ↓

Wheel: hue (← →) and saturation, how vivid (↑ ↓). Hold Shift for bigger steps. Lightness slider: the arrow keys.

[ ]

Wheel: go to the previous or next colour.

+ −

Wheel: add a colour, or remove the last colour you added.

← → ↑ ↓

Shelf: move between paints. Hold Shift to select more.

↓

Paint field (“Paint or #hex”): open the list. In the colour grid, the arrow keys move in all four directions. Home and End go to the start and the end of a row; with Ctrl, to the first and the last paint. Tab goes to Sort. In a list of names, ↑ and ↓ move.

Enter

Paint field: start the scheme from the paint or the colour that the list shows as active. A hex such as #9A1115 changes the starting colour as you type; 9A1115 or #9A1 needs Enter. Other brands tab: show the matches for the palette colour that has focus.

Shift F10

Open the mark menu: on the Shelf for the selection (Start a scheme from this, Mark owned, Add to shopping list and Clear mark), and in the paint field's list for the active paint (Mark owned, Add to shopping list and Clear mark). The Menu key on a Windows keyboard does the same. On a touch screen, press and hold a paint; with a mouse, right-click it.

P U X

Shelf: mark the selection as owned, add it to the shopping list, or clear its marks.

Esc

Close a list, menu, sheet or dialog. In the paint field, after a hex that changed the starting colour as you typed, Esc also puts back the starting paint from before. On the Shelf, clear the selection.

Contact and privacy

Use the contact page at ryanmette.com. To help me fix a problem quickly, include:

• what you were doing when it went wrong;
• your device and browser, or your iPhone or iPad model and iOS version;
• if the problem is with a scheme, a link to it (⋯ → Share link).

Palette Studio collects no personal data. Read the privacy policy.