28 June 2007 ~ 10 Comments

A handy tool for designers – Ades Color Picker

Ades Color PickerHow many times when you’re designing something have you wanted to grab a color from a source outside of Photoshop (for example) and had to make a screenshot, load it into Photoshop and then grab the color? What if you’re not working in Photoshop or any other paint program for that matter and simply need to grab a color from something on your screen to e-mail someone, save for later, etc? The process of then making the screenshot, creating a new file in Photoshop, pasting the screenshot and THEN grabbing the color becomes even more tedious. Why do all of that if you don’t have to? Enter Ades Color Picker available at AdesBlog.com.

Ades Color PickerAdes color picker is a simple little tool that will reside in your system tray waiting for you to execute the appropriate keystrokes to call it into action. By default the keystroke to activate the color picker is CTRL+ALT+A. As soon as the application is activated you’ll see something very similar to the image on the right. Ades Color Picker will then allow you to output RGB, HTML, C++, VB, and Delphi color codes and once you make your color selection the values will be stored in your clipboard, allowing you to paste them into place wherever you choose.

System requirements for Ades Color Picker are very modest. As long as you have at least a Windows Pentium II processor and 128 megabytes of RAM, you’re good to go. Most people nowadays have those numbers covered easily. There’s a trial version of the color picker available allowing you to give it a good test run. Keep in mind however that you’ll only be able to select colors in RGB mode with the trial version. If you decide you’d like the full version, it can be acquired for less than 10 bucks via PayPal or credit card.

10 Responses to “A handy tool for designers – Ades Color Picker”

  1. Bush Mackel 28 June 2007 at 2:33 pm Permalink

    I’ve seen this here and there. I tend to just do a screen cap with Paint Shop Pro and go from there, though this would probably be a lot more efficient.

  2. Mike 28 June 2007 at 5:35 pm Permalink

    You get a nice PR7 backlink for reviewing this thing though :D

  3. Danielle 28 June 2007 at 6:32 pm Permalink

    I have that color picker too (along with the PR7 link!).

  4. Hernan 29 June 2007 at 1:01 am Permalink

    Very creative tool. Awesome!!…hope the version 3.0 will come with CMYK colors codes :)

  5. Wes Mahler 29 June 2007 at 5:39 am Permalink

    I LOVE IT!

    Thanks so much, I have to do that garbage every day, switching between apps and photoshop, I was literally doing it an hour ago, and was doing exactly what u said.

    THANKS GREAT FIND!

  6. Wes Mahler 29 June 2007 at 5:41 am Permalink

    ack $9.95!! to purchase!

    ah, I’ll buy it i should be helpful

  7. Mike 29 June 2007 at 5:41 am Permalink

    I hear ya about doing it every day…lol. I constantly am as well. Anything that makes the process is simpler makes me happy :)

  8. Christy 29 June 2007 at 8:12 am Permalink

    Really great review Mike, you definitely deserve the linkback! :)

  9. Bob 1 July 2007 at 3:10 pm Permalink

    Does it work on Mac?

  10. Mike 1 July 2007 at 4:34 pm Permalink

    Hey Bob. No right now there only seems to be a PC version.


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