Coloring Techniques
Color can both increase the beauty of a tessellation as well as
contribute to its understanding. Consider the following example:
 
These two images are of the same tessellation. However, the one
of the left is not as visually appealing as the one on the right.
Additionally, the color in the one on the right tells us important
information: we can see clearly that the tessellation is made
up of three types of shapes: hexagons (purple), equilateral triangles
(blue), and squares (white). We can easily isolate in our minds
each of the different types of shapes. For example, the equilateral
triangles are arranged either in side-by-side pairs or alone.
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The colored tessellation above illustrates the most straight-forward
common coloring technique: color all the shapes of a particular
type the same color. For example, all hexagons in the tessellation
above are colored purple, all squares are colored white, and all
equilateral triangles are colored yellow.
Another coloring technique is to use the same color to fill entire
regions that you wish to emphasize. In this technique, you pay
less attention to the kind of shapes you are coloring but more attention to the overall shape that you create with color. Consider
the following examples:
Notice that some equilateral triangles are blue while others are
pink. This type of coloring focuses more on the overall shapes
formed by colors. In this tessellation, the "rings" of shapes
around the hexagons are colored pink while the spaces between
these "rings" are colored blue and the hexagons themselves are
colored yellow.
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This type of coloring focuses more on the overall shapes formed
by colors. In particular, a light yellow color is used in this
tessellation to form continuous vertical strips of polygons.
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Yet another technique is to cycle colors in a predictable manner.
This technique is similar to the last one described in that little
attention is given to the coloring of types of shapes. Instead,
opportunities to use cycles of colors are sought. Consider the
following example:
The colors red, blue, and white are cycled around each "ring"
of shapes surrounding each hexagon. All "rings" are colored in
this way, and the spaces between "rings" are colored black. Furthermore,
the hexagons themselves are given a light gray shade. Altogether,
the resulting tessellation is very interesting.
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A last technique that will be mentioned is to remove the outline
of the shapes. Throughout this site, the black outline remains
in the tessellations, but this is done only for instructional
purposes. When the outlines are removed, the resulting tessellations
can be very striking. (Note, however, that adjacent shapes of
the same color may merge into a single shape after removing the
outline.) Consider the following example:
A version of the previous tessellation without outlines. Does
this tessellation seem to pop out in three dimensions to you?
It should. Read on to find out why.
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The examples on this page should give you some insight into the
many ways tessellations can be colored. It should also raise your
curiosity. In fact, if you review the images on this page, you
will notice that each is a different coloring of the same tessellation!
So, in addition to the infinite number of ways you can create
and modify tessellations, you also have an infinite number ways
to color them!
This section was not meant to be a comprehensive introduction
to colors (see the web links below for more information). Enough
background information has been provided in order for you to make
new discoveries in coloring tessellations. Of course, the most
important thing to do is to experiment yourself!
  
 Visit the templates page for templates of tessellations that you
can print out and color.
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