Colors for chart bars

[Christian Christmann]

Hi,

in a document I want to add a bar chart. This document will
is a paper and later converted to pdf. In the diagram I will
have tree groups with 4 bars each. My question:
which color would you take for the 4 adjacent bars? And what
DPI? The diagram (figure in eps format) will be relatively
small and I want that the reader can still distinguish among
the bars when the paper is printed. Are there any preferred
combinations of colors due to the "theory of colors"?

Thank you.

Chris

 

[Guest]

If you're trying to get the most visually diverse colors, I would try to take
colors from opposite ends of the color wheel. For example, if the chart has
2 bars those colors would be 180 degrees apart. If it has three bars then
120 degrees apart. If it has four bars then 90 degrees apart. To view a
color wheel, try googling "color wheel" and you should get a lot of results.