Misusing or Overusing Color

We've already seen several examples of misused or overused color. The remaining point that I want to emphasize here is that color should not be used haphazardly.

Color choices should be made thoughtfully, with an understanding of how we perceive color and the significance of color differences. Some colors are hot and demand our attention, while others are cooler and less visible. When any color appears as a contrast relative to the norm, our eyes pay attention and our brains attempt to assign meaning to that contrast. When colors in two different sections of a dashboard are the same, we are tempted to relate them to one another. We merrily assume that we can use colors such as red, yellow, and green to assign important meanings to data, but in doing so we exclude the 10% of males and 1% of females who are color-blind. In Chapter 4, Tapping into the Power of Visual Perception, we'll learn a bit about color and how it can be used meaningfully and powerfully.