The Science of Design:

Why a Color Palette Matters in Science

You might wonder why a scientist should worry about a color palette. Surprisingly, a well-chosen color palette can make your presentations, reports, and websites feel organized and cohesive.  Moreover, colors have the power to evoke emotions and underline your goals.

This is essential in connecting with your specific audience. Consider what look and feel you want to convey through branded material. For example, blue often evokes calm and trust, which is why it’s prevalent in the life sciences. 

One of our favorite tools for creating a color palette is a web app called Coolors.co. This tool helps you pick a primary color and then suggests secondary highlight colors.

You can see SayoStudio’s color palette below, where we use brighter secondary colors for elements like buttons and headlines to draw attention. Those of you who are familiar with our work, know that our illustrations, design, and animation use a whole spectrum of colors.

Where our palette is powerful, is pulling all of these varying pieces together. We use it for our fonts and background colors across our website, promotional materials, and our social media platforms to keep our content on-brand, cohesive, and visually appealing.

When working with companies, keeping consistent colors is one key way to help make sure that figures, illustrations, marketing content, and scientific art align with the overall branding strategy. You may ask, do you ALWAYS have to use your color palette? Of course not, but the more you can pull in some of the colors, the more memorable your vision will be. If you find yourself consistently straying from your palette, ask yourself if it’s time to readjust and redefine your colors. 

The Ubiquity of Blue in Life Science and Tech Companies

If you’re in the life sciences, you’re probably familiar with the ubiquitous cyan blue. Psychological studies have shown that blue evokes feelings of calm and trust, sentiments that align well with pharmaceutical companies researching new therapies. Even with the same blue as 50 other companies,  you can choose bold secondary colors to complement and set yourself apart.

Life Science color palette examples, beyond blue

Here are a couple of example palettes we generated using Coolors:

In the palettes above, you’ll see three color codes: HEX, RGB, and CMYK. You can use these in any design program to make sure you’re getting the exact match. Curious about what they mean? Here is a quick summary:

HEX

• Meaning: Six-digit hexadecimal number.
• Format: #RRGGBB (e.g., #FFFFFF for white).
• Use: Web design and digital graphics.

RGB

• Meaning: Red, Green, Blue.
• Format: rgb(R, G, B) with values from 0-255 (e.g., rgb(255, 0, 0) for red).
• Use: Digital screens (monitors, TVs).

CMYK

• Meaning: Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, Key (black).
• Format: cmyk(C%, M%, Y%, K%) (e.g., cmyk(0%, 100%, 100%, 0%) for red).
• Use: Printing materials (magazines, flyers).