How To Use The Color Theme Tool In Adobe InDesign CC

How to Use the InDesign Color Theme Tool to Match Colours from an Image

If a flyer, poster, or social graphic has a colour that feels a bit randomly chosen, the background image is usually the best place to look for a better palette. InDesign’s Color Theme tool can pull a set of colours from the page and turn them into reusable swatches.

In this example, the bright green sale tag does not really connect with the kitchen image behind it. The goal is to sample colours from that image, save a useful palette, then use those colours throughout the document.

Find the Color Theme tool in InDesign

The Color Theme tool is tucked in with the Eyedropper tool. Click and hold the Eyedropper icon in the Tools panel, then choose Color Theme Tool from the fly-out menu.

With the tool active, click anywhere on the page. InDesign analyses the artwork and creates a group of five colour swatches based on the colours it finds.

The important thing to know is that the click location does not limit the sampling area. Even if you click directly on the background image, InDesign considers colours from the entire page.

Remove colours you do not want sampled

This whole-page sampling behaviour matters. If an unwanted element is sitting on top of the image, its colour can show up in the generated theme.

Here, the green sale tag is the colour we are trying to replace, but it is being included in the first palette. The simple fix is to cut that tag temporarily, leaving it on the clipboard. Generate the theme again and the green is no longer influencing the result.

That gives you a palette led by the background image instead of the distracting colour you are trying to get rid of.

Choose a colour variation that fits the design

After creating a colour theme, use the small arrow in the Color Theme panel to try different variations. The default is Colorful, but there are also options such as:

• Dark

• Deep

• Muted

These variations can be quite similar, but they give you a quick way to steer the mood of the palette. For this flyer, the colorful option keeps the warmer orange and yellow tones from the kitchen image, which works nicely for a spring sale design.

Save the generated palette to Swatches

Once you have a palette you like, add it to the Swatches panel. InDesign creates a colour group containing the theme colours, so they are ready to apply again without sampling the image each time.

This is much better than manually guessing at similar colours. The choices are now connected to the image, and they remain available while you work through the rest of the layout.

Add the colours to a Creative Cloud library

You can also add the theme colours to a Creative Cloud library. This is particularly useful when the layout includes artwork that needs to be edited in Illustrator.

Adding the palette to the library means the same image-led colours travel with you between Adobe applications. Rather than trying to rebuild the palette in Illustrator, the swatches are already there and ready to use.

Recolour an Illustrator asset with the new palette

Paste the sale tag back into the InDesign layout. If it needs to move behind another object, send it backward one level using:

• Command + [ on Mac

• Control + [ on Windows

Then double-click the library asset to open it in Illustrator. Because the colours were saved to the Creative Cloud library, the new swatches appear there as well.

Select the tag shape and apply one of the sampled colours. In this case, the green tag becomes a warm yellow pulled from the kitchen image. Save the Illustrator file, close it, and return to InDesign. Give it a moment and the linked asset updates in the layout.

Use the Color Theme tool like an eyedropper

The tool is also handy for applying individual colours directly in the document. Select an object, then use a colour from the generated theme to recolour it.

For the flyer, that means using the warmer orange tone on the bottom bar and applying other sampled shades where needed. There are only a few coloured blocks in this design, but the principle scales well: keep pulling from the same image-led palette and the layout starts to feel cohesive.

A simple workflow for matching colours in InDesign

1. Choose the image that should lead the design’s colour direction.

2. Temporarily remove any objects with colours you do not want included.

3. Use the Color Theme tool to generate a palette.

4. Try the Colorful, Dark, Deep, and Muted variations.

5. Save the useful theme to Swatches.

6. Add it to a Creative Cloud library when Illustrator assets are involved.

7. Recolour layout elements and linked artwork using the sampled palette.

The result is not just a nicer tag or footer bar. It is a document where the design colours feel like they came from the same place as the image, rather than being dropped in from somewhere else.

FAQ's

Where is the Color Theme tool in InDesign?

Click and hold the Eyedropper tool in the Tools panel, then choose the Color Theme tool from the fly-out options.

Does the Color Theme tool sample only where I click?

No. Although you click on the page to create a theme, InDesign pulls colours from the whole page. Temporarily remove unwanted elements if their colours are affecting the palette.

Can I reuse an InDesign colour theme in Illustrator?

Yes. Add the theme to a Creative Cloud library, then open the Illustrator asset from that library. The saved colour swatches are available for recolouring the artwork.