In order to properly create the atmosphere I needed for my comic, I first had to take a closer look at how colour interacted with my own style. I have a history of using colour as a conduit for emotion, a technique I have taken from Expressionism. As such I decided to to a deep dive into the relationship between the Horror genre and colour.
Colour & Horror:
YELLOW
In Horror this is the colour of anxiety. Often found in warning signs on chemicals it creates a sense of something noxious and makes the reader feel tense and on edge. A good example of this is found in "The Yellow Wallpaper" by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. Here it is the colour of subtle creeping fear, a perfect connection to the story I am telling.
What is most interesting is that the primary associations with this colour are actually generally positive. Whether it is sunlight, various flowers, in open fields or elsewhere, yellow is seen as the "happy" colour. This is what makes it so effective. By subverting the expectation and transforming it to a colour of unease it creates a unique duality. Yellow evokes terror, not horror, benefitting from being over-used by becoming oppressive (as in The Yellow Wallpaper). It is also the colour of older indoor lights, making it the ideal primary colour of the indoor scenes which make up the majority of the comic.
RED
A classic horror colour, red is well used and, despite its proliferation, it remains effective. The colour of blood and gore, red represents immediate fear. It deals with horror not terror, its eyecatching nature and its use in the colour of roadside warning signs, elevates the human heart rate. It creates a point of focus and counteracts the slow burn anxiety of yellow. As such it is best used sparingly at key moments of high action or horror. It is often used in film as a counterpoint to black and white, the flared splash of red standing out to create a shock effect.
Offering another duality, red is also the colour of love, passion, and sexuality. I contemplated playing with this in the comic, using it in relation to the connection between my protagonist and her husband. The mix of this passion with the need for gore created an interesting effect.
BLACK
The traditional lack of colour, its obvious use in horror is to represent a fear of the unknown. Often paired with red, the two serve as a common horror base colour scheme. This can be found in many horror film posters/logos, a stark black text on a bloodied background, or vice-versa.
When combined with white for a monochrome colour palette it allows the action to take center stage. The lack of colour and extensive use of shadow can be highly effective in its pared-down nature. Junji Ito often makes powerful use of this.
WHITE
The colour of purity and cleanliness. This, much like yellow, becomes horrific when used to an oppressive extent. Blinding white light cutting through the colour can be just as horrifying as it is comforting. I used this as the colour worn by my protagonist, an obsessively clean germophobic housewife to build that sense of oppressive cleanliness that I could progressively dirty as her sanity failed.
BLUE
The colour of the night, blue doesn't have the disadvantages of using pure black. With blue the option of going darker for emphasis is still available, whilst also offering many similar advantages to the horror created by black. Colour of sadness and tragedy, blue also contains the duality as a colour of calm and relaxation. The primary colour used in my night scenes, blue allows my protagonist to be free to be her freaky self. It also hints toward the breakdown of her sanity. A stark contrast to the yellow lights that represent the oppressive boredom of her daily life.
This use of colour isn't new. Found in many Old Soviet Cartoons from the time period in which my comic is set, they are combined with deliberately off-center and often janky line art to play on the uncanny. While using colour in such a way may be cliched, the heightened, slightly cartoonish tone of my story feeds well into them. By mixing the colour with my own unique style I am able to create an original take on the cliche.
Limitation & Style
For this comic, I decided to make use of a line drawing style similar to the work of Kyoko Okazaki. The clean yet evocative art style is ideal for the theme and drive of my story. The use of monochrome colours with accents of specific shades or contrasts to highlight key characters or objects creates a stark and uncomfortable tone. By also using different shades during key scenes I was able to communicate the monotony and clinical cleanliness of the setting at the start of the film. The use of limited colour also feeds into symbolism and narrative communication, taking a step away from my usual highly-colourised approach to really focus on what the colours evoke. This had the additional benefit of streamlining the process allowing me to tell a complete, compelling story. By limiting myself I was able to innovate making greater use of colour to not only show emotion but actually act as a part of the narrative.
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