Color picker

Last update: Thu Feb 26 2026 00:00:00 GMT+0000 (Coordinated Universal Time)

The color picker allows to set a color to paint or project on the mesh. It can be used to pick colors from external images or to adjust an existing one within the application.

The color picker window appears when clicking on any color field in Painter, which can be found in Properties or within any additional settings or menus, like Display or Shader parameters.

Color picker overview

Once open, the color picker is semi-persistent, which means that it will stay open until a change of context - for instance, when switching from a paint layer to a fill layer. It is possible to move the window around and place it anywhere on any of the available screens. However unlike other windows the color picker cannot be docked.

The window has a vertical layout and is comprised of three sections:

Gradient picker (or spectrum)
Sliders (RGB/HSV)
Swatches

{width="200px"}

Gradient picker (spectrum)

Name and visual

Description

Display selector

{width="250px"}

Allow to choose which display to use to edit colors (spectrum and sliders). The default value match the Display used by the main viewport. Note: This setting is only available when color management is enabled.

Spectrum

{width="250px"}

The vertical slider is the general hue. It allows to select the shade of color to display within the gradient field.Once the general shade is selected, it is possible to hold and drag the crosshair cursor in the gradient field to select the desired color. Note: When color management is enabled, HDR colors from the current Display will be clamped (in working color space). This is to avoid output HDR value in color managed channels.

Current and previous color

The left rectangle indicates the final color that will be output from the color picker.The right rectangle shows the previous color (when the color picker was opened). It is possible to click on it to restore the previous color and make it the current one.

Hexadecimal field

The hexadecimal fields represent the current color as hexadecimals values. The RGB components are represented as a pair of letters.For example #FF0000 represent the red color. Note: When color management is enabled, the hexadecimal field always work in the standard sRGB color space to make it easier to copy/paste values across software, no matter the current display or working space used by the project…

Eyedropper

The eyedropper can be used to pick a color from an external source. To use it click on the icon then move the mouse and again to copy the color wanted. Note: When selecting a color inside the viewport, it is possible to use the Shift modifier to pick the current channel edited directly. This avoid doing lossy color conversion between the original texture and the color displayed on screen. This is also useful to pick colors without having to switch from the Material display mode.

{width="150"}

Note: Color fields also feature an eyedropper next to them and can be used to quickly pick colors without having to open the color picker.

Note: On Mac OS, the eyedropper may not be able to pick colors outside of the application interface because of privacy settings. To fix this issue, assign the proper rights to the application in: System Preferences > Security & Privacy > Privacy > Screen Recording

Color settings

Setting

Description

Eyedropper color space

Specify the color space for color selected outside of the viewport.The auto setting uses the Standard sRGB color space from the project settings.

Note: This setting also applies on eyedroppers next to color buttons. Note: Colors selected inside the viewport also use this profile when not using the Shift modifier.

Sliders

Color sliders allow for a manual adjustment of individual values.

The sliders can be set two different modes, HSV or RGB. To change the mode, use the dedicated dropdown menu.

HSV

HSV stands for Hue, Saturation and Value.

Hue allows to cycle through the global color families, much like the vertical gradient slider.

Saturation controls the richness of the selected color, and goes from grayscale to fully saturated.

Value determines how dark or light a color is, and it ranges from fully black to fully white.

RGB

RGB stands for Red, Green and Blue.

These are the main components used digitally to store colors in computer graphics. Each slider represents how much of the component is present in the final color.

Example: the image below has a color that contains a 100% of red, but 50% of blue and green.

It is more common to have the RGB sliders measured via 0-255 values. This can be done by disabling the Floating point values option.

Sliders settings

The settings menu allow to configure a few additional behaviors:

Setting

Description

Dynamic sliders

If enabled, the background color of the sliders will adjust based on the current color.

Floating point values

If enabled, sliders values are represented going from 0.0 to 1.0.If disabled:

HSV: the hue slider is measured in degrees (like a color wheel). Saturation and Value use percentages.
RGB: components are represented as value going from 0 to 255.