Chapter 3: Color‑Blind Safe Sets & Checks

Created by Sarah Choi (prompt writer using ChatGPT)

Color‑Blind Safe Sets & Checks for Costume Concept Artists

When you design costumes for games and cinematic worlds, you’re not just painting for yourself or for a single perfect monitor. You’re designing for a huge range of players, screens, and visual abilities. That includes players with different forms of color vision deficiency (CVD)—often called color‑blindness.

Color‑blind safe design is not only a UI problem. Costumes themselves carry gameplay information: faction, role, danger, safety, status. If those signals vanish or get muddied for a portion of your audience, the game becomes harder to read and less inclusive.

This article focuses on color engineering for costumes with an emphasis on:

  • Building palette sets that are resilient under common color‑blind conditions.
  • Using value and contrast as primary carriers of information.
  • Practical checks and workflows for both concept‑side and production‑side costume artists.

We’ll stay art‑friendly and practical, and we’ll approach this equally from the angle of early exploration and final production handoff.

1. What Color‑Blindness Means for Costume Color

Color vision deficiency doesn’t mean “seeing in grayscale.” Most color‑blind people see color, just differently. Certain hue ranges compress, shift, or become harder to distinguish.

For costume concept work, the main takeaway is:

You cannot rely on hue alone—especially not specific red/green or blue/yellow differences—to communicate critical information.

The three most common types of CVD you’ll hear about are:

  • Protan (protanopia/protanomaly) – Reduced sensitivity to red.
  • Deutan (deuteranopia/deuteranomaly) – Reduced sensitivity to green.
  • Tritan (tritanopia/tritanomaly) – Reduced sensitivity to blue (less common).

The exact science is deeper, but what matters for you is simple: certain color pairs collapse, and some saturated colors shift toward muddy or similar hues.

If your entire faction distinction is “red team vs green team” with similar value and saturation, those teams will be hard to tell apart for many players.

2. Design Priorities: Value and Shape First, Hue Second

The foundation of color‑blind safe costume design is the same foundation of good design in general:

  • Silhouette and shape language carry role and faction.
  • Value structure carries hierarchy and readability.
  • Hue and saturation are supporting actors, not the sole leads.

Value as the primary channel

Value (light/dark) survives most color shifts. So:

  • Design each role or faction with a distinct value profile.
  • Use big value groups—light, mid, dark—to separate teams and roles.
  • Ensure that at gameplay distance, the value read alone can tell you “this is my ally,” “this is my healer,” etc.

A good test: convert your costume lineup to grayscale and ask:

  • Can I still tell factions apart?
  • Can I still identify key roles (healer, tank, assassin) just by value and silhouette?

If the answer is no, your design is fragile even before considering color‑blindness.

Shape and material cues

Color‑blind safe design also leans on shape and material differences:

  • Factions can differ by silhouette (spiky vs rounded, layered vs streamlined).
  • Roles can use consistent material motifs (cloth‑heavy healers, spiky metal tanks, sleek leather rogues).
  • Pattern types (stripes, checkers, trim placements) can serve as extra “flags.”

Color is then used to reinforce these distinctions, not create them from scratch.

3. Building Color‑Blind Aware Palette Sets

A palette set is a group of colors assigned to a faction, role, or tier of character. To make these sets safer for color‑blind conditions, we don’t avoid color—we engineer it.

Step 1: Start from value and saturation

Before locking hues, choose:

  • A base value range for the set (overall darker, lighter, or mid).
  • A general saturation feel (muted realism vs stylized vibrancy).

Example:

  • Faction A: mid‑dark, more saturated.
  • Faction B: mid‑light, less saturated but with high‑contrast accents.

Already, even if hue collapses, value and saturation give you separation.

Step 2: Choose robust hue separations

Some hue pairs are riskier (e.g., pure red vs pure green) than others. While you don’t need to memorize all CVD behavior, a few practical rules help:

  • Avoid relying on only red vs green at similar value and saturation for critical differences.
  • Prefer hue differences that also change warm vs cool and value—for instance, deep warm reds vs cooler blue‑greens at different brightness levels.
  • Push hues away from each other more than you might in a purely aesthetic palette.

Think of it as exaggerating the hue differences to survive real‑world conditions.

Step 3: Assign roles within each set

Within a faction palette, break down colors by role:

  • Tanks might lean toward the darker, more neutral side of the palette.
  • Healers might use lighter, softer variants.
  • Assassins might sit in mid‑dark with unique accent placements.

Tie role differences to value and accent placement as much as hue.

4. Value and Contrast Strategies That Survive CVD

Because CVD affects hue relationships more than value, smart value planning makes your costumes far more robust.

Global vs local contrast

  • Global contrast – The overall difference between character and background.
  • Local contrast – Differences within the costume (e.g., between chest emblem and armor).

For color‑blind safety:

  • Ensure global contrast is sufficient so characters don’t disappear into typical environments.
  • Place local contrast where gameplay needs it most: around faces, faction insignias, weak points, or important interactable elements on the costume.

Contrast placement examples

  • If two factions fight in a dark dungeon, give one faction overall higher values (lighter outfits) and the other overall lower values (darker outfits) with clear silhouettes.
  • Within a single faction, role‑critical elements like healer symbols or support backpacks should have strong local value contrast against the base costume.

Think: where does the player’s eye need to go, even if hue information is unreliable?

5. Accessibility‑Friendly Triads and Schemes

You can still use triads, complementary schemes, and fancy palettes. The trick is to build them with redundant clarity.

Uneven triads with distinct roles

Instead of a flat, evenly weighted red‑yellow‑blue triad, try:

  • Primary – One hue that carries faction identity (e.g., cool blue).
  • Secondary – A hue that shifts both temperature and value (e.g., warm, darker red‑brown).
  • Accent – A small area, high‑contrast hue (e.g., bright off‑white or gold).

Make sure:

  • The primary and secondary differ in value, not just hue.
  • The accent stands out in grayscale and under desaturated conditions.

Minimizing ambiguous mid‑tones

Certain mid‑value, mid‑saturation colors can merge under CVD. You can reduce confusion by:

  • Pushing faction colors toward more distinct value bands.
  • Avoiding subtle hue shifts as the only difference between forms (e.g., slightly red‑brown vs slightly green‑brown coats).

If you need subtlety for style, lean on pattern, texture, and cut rather than hue alone to differentiate variants.

6. Costume Elements That Need Extra Attention

Some costume areas carry more gameplay weight than others. These are where color‑blind safe design matters most.

Faction flags and insignias

  • Use clear shapes and strong value contrast between symbol and background.
  • Avoid pairing pure red insignias on pure green fields or vice versa; adjust value and saturation so symbol remains legible under CVD.

Team‑specific accessories

  • Armbands, capes, sashes, and helmets often carry team color.
  • Ensure their value and placement make them visible from key camera angles.
  • Consider combining color with pattern (e.g., striped armband vs solid armband) to add another layer of distinction.

UI‑critical costume details

  • Health packs, ammo belts, weak‑point glows, or buff indicators often live on the costume.
  • Design them with redundant cues: distinct shapes, blinking or emissive effects in engine, and strong local value contrast.

If the entire gameplay mechanic depends on recognizing a colored patch on the costume, that patch must be readable long before hue differences.

7. Practical Checks You Can Do as a Concept Artist

You don’t have to be a programmer or accessibility engineer to make your concepts safer. A few simple checks built into your workflow can go a long way.

Check 1: Grayscale pass

At any stage—thumbnail, flat color, or final concept—

  • Convert your image to grayscale (or paint a quick grayscale version).
  • Zoom out to gameplay scale.
  • Check if you can still see:
    • Faction differences.
    • Role indicators.
    • Face and hand readability.

If you lose distinctions, fix the value structure before worrying about hue tweaks.

Check 2: Desaturation test

Without fully going grayscale, try:

  • Dropping saturation of the entire image significantly.
  • Observing which differences survive.

If two factions or roles become nearly identical, you may be over‑relying on saturation and hue.

Check 3: Small‑scale read

On your canvas:

  • Shrink your character lineup down to tiny thumbnails (like what you’d see in minimap portraits or distant gameplay).
  • Ask whether you can quickly tell factions and roles apart.

This is where value, silhouette, and major accent placements prove their worth.

8. Exploration‑Side vs Production‑Side Responsibilities

Exploration‑side costume artists

Your job is to generate possibilities, but you can still respect accessibility early.

  • When you explore faction or role palettes, try multiple approaches: one that pushes value separation, one that uses pattern differences, one that experiments with accent placement.
  • Mark which explorations feel robust even when converted to grayscale.
  • Avoid locking the project into a concept where core readability depends on unstable color pairs.

You don’t have to solve every accessibility issue yet, but you can avoid planting bad seeds.

Production‑side costume artists

You are closer to implementation, so your role is more systematic.

  • Create palette sheets that show faction/role colors in normal, grayscale, and low‑saturation versions.
  • Note where you expect engineering or UI art to add additional cues (emissive outlines, icons, VFX).
  • Call out any risky color pairs and suggest backups or patterns.

You can also collaborate with UI/UX and tech art to test how costumes look under in‑game color‑blind filters, if the engine provides them.

9. Designing Faction Sets with Color‑Blind Safety in Mind

As a concrete example, imagine you’re designing two opposing factions.

Faction A: Order of the Ember

Design goals:

  • Feels warm, structured, martial.
  • Primary arena is a cool, desaturated environment.

Color engineering:

  • Base value: mid‑dark overall, so silhouettes sit clearly against lighter, cool backgrounds.
  • Primary hue: deep, slightly desaturated red‑brown.
  • Secondary hue: dark neutral steel/charcoal.
  • Accent: light, near‑white or pale gold trim and insignias.

Notes:

  • Even if red shifts or dulls under CVD, the light accents vs dark base keep the faction readable.
  • Insignias use strong value separation and simple shapes.

Faction B: Tideborn Covenant

Design goals:

  • Feels cool, fluid, tactical.
  • Must still be distinguishable from Order of the Ember in poor conditions.

Color engineering:

  • Base value: mid‑light to mid, to contrast with Faction A’s darker base.
  • Primary hue: teal‑blue, slightly desaturated.
  • Secondary hue: dark neutral grey‑blue.
  • Accent: intense but small yellow‑white glow on tech nodes.

Notes:

  • Even if red/green discrimination is reduced, the value profile (lighter vs darker) and the placement of light accents on different regions (shoulders vs chest) create redundant cues.
  • Both factions have neutral elements (greys, steels) that anchor them; the difference isn’t only red vs green.

This approach builds factions that feel vivid in full color but still separable when hue information is compromised.

10. Communicating Accessibility Intent in Your Deliverables

Accessibility thinking is only useful if the rest of the team can see it. As a costume concept artist, you can:

  • Include grayscale thumbnails alongside your colored costume sheets.
  • Annotate palette strips with notes like “Faction A: overall darker values; bright insignias for readability,” or “Healer accents: high value contrast vs base costume.”
  • Provide simple diagrams showing where key role markers sit (e.g., healer emblem always on chest and back, tank emblems on shoulders).

These don’t have to be long essays—short, pointed notes are enough to signal your intent to art direction, 3D, and UI/UX.

11. Summary: Designing for More Eyes, Not Fewer Colors

Color‑blind safe design isn’t about avoiding rich colors or flattening your palettes. It’s about:

  • Treating value, shape, and material as primary carriers of information.
  • Building palette sets that separate factions and roles through multiple channels: value, saturation, pattern, and placement.
  • Using triads and schemes that survive desaturation and hue shifts.
  • Running simple checks—grayscale, low saturation, small scale—to catch fragile decisions early.
  • Communicating your accessibility intent to the rest of the team.

Whether you’re in the blue‑sky phase or final production painting, thinking about color‑blind safe sets and checks makes your costume concepts more robust, more readable in real gameplay, and more inclusive to the full range of players who’ll live with your designs.