color harmonizer

The color harmonizer reduces chromatic dissonance by pushing hues toward a selected color palette. This palette is defined by a set of hue angles called harmony nodes. Colors that are “off-palette” are gently pulled toward the nearest node; colors already on a node are left unchanged. A per-node saturation multiplier can additionally boost or reduce the colorfulness of colors near each node.

🔗module controls

harmony rule

Select one of the harmony rules. All node positions are offsets from the anchor hue. Angles are in degrees.

Rule	Nodes	Node positions	Character
Monochromatic	1	0°	Single hue family
Analogous	3	0°, −30°, +30°	Adjacent neighbors; naturalistic, cohesive
Analogous complementary	4	0°, −30°, +30°, +180°	Analogous triad plus its opposite
Complementary	2	0°, +180°	Direct opposites; maximum contrast
Split complementary	3	0°, +150°, +210°	Anchor plus both neighbors of its complement
Dyad	2	−30°, +30°	Anchor is symmetry axis, not a node
Triad	3	0°, +120°, +240°	Evenly spaced; balanced, colorful
Tetrad	4	−30°, +30°, +150°, +210°	Two dyad pairs; anchor is symmetry axis, not a node
Square	4	0°, +90°, +180°, +270°	Four equally spaced hues
Custom	2–4	Freely placed	User-defined node positions

Note on dyad and tetrad: the anchor hue sets the symmetry axis of the pattern, not the position of a node. The palette is symmetric around the anchor. This matches the vectorscope harmony guide overlay.

infer from image (standard modes only)

Analyses the preview image’s chroma-weighted hue histogram and automatically selects the harmony rule and anchor hue that best fit the image’s existing color distribution — i.e. the combination that already covers the most chromatic energy and therefore requires the least correction.

anchor hue

The primary hue from which all node positions are derived (not shown in custom mode). Expressed as a normalized value displayed in degrees. An eyedropper

is available to sample a color directly from the image. The color swatch strip below the slider shows the actual node colors for quick visual feedback.

vectorscope two-way sync

When enabled (default), any change to the harmony rule, anchor hue, or custom node positions is immediately reflected in the vectorscope harmony overlay, and changes made in the vectorscope, i.e. changing the overlayed rule or rotating the overlay, are reflected back in the module. Disable to make adjustments without disturbing the vectorscope display. If enabled, using the module will automatically switch the scopes module to show the vectorscope.

import from vectorscope (standard modes only)

Imports the harmony rule and anchor hue currently configured in the vectorscope panel, then switches the histogram panel to the vectorscope view.

nodes (custom mode only)

Number of active harmony nodes in custom mode (2–4). Only the first N node rows are shown and active; the others are hidden.

node hue sliders (custom mode only)

One row per active node. Each row shows a color swatch and a hue slider with an eyedropper. The hue slider sets the node position on the hue wheel (0°–360°). Use the eyedropper to sample a desired hue directly from the image.

🔗Effect controls

pull strength: Colours will be shifted depending on their proximity to the nodes. The shift is strongest for pixels between nodes, and weakest (or zero) for pixels exactly on a node.
Note: pull strength scales the hue correction only. The saturation correction (per-node saturation multipliers) is applied independently, at full strength regardless of this slider.
pull width: Scales the width of each node’s attraction zone.

< 1 (narrow): quick decay; only hues very close to a node are attracted. The rest of the hue wheel is barely touched. Useful for images already close to harmonic, or when precise, surgical correction of specific hues is needed.
= 1 (default): medium decay — clean zone separation with smooth transitions.
> 1 (wide): no decay; all pixels are attracted noticeably regardless of how far they are from a node. Useful to suppress colors outside the target harmony.

Increasing pull width never displaces pixels that are already exactly on a harmony node — their angular distance to the nearest node is zero, so their hue shift is always zero.

neutral color protection

Shields low-chroma pixels from correction.

The slider sets how aggressively low-chroma pixels are exempted: low values protect only near-absolute grays; high values extend protection to muted and pastel tones. Even at the maximum, vivid colors remain largely unaffected.

Default: 0.50.

smoothing

This smooths the spatial transitions at zone boundaries — visible as subtle colour steps in smooth gradients like skies or skin when adjacent regions fall in different attraction zones.

The blur sigma scales with both this slider and the current pull width: wider attraction zones span larger hue ranges and generate larger corrections, which can produce sharper spatial boundaries when pixels near each other fall on opposite sides of a zone midpoint.

0 (default, off): transitions are handled purely by the Gaussian interpolation in hue space. Maximum detail is preserved. Recommended for most uses.
0.1–0.5: subtle spatial averaging to reduce colour noise in smooth areas.
> 1.0: broad spatial blending; can create a painterly effect but may bleed corrections across image edges.

🔗Saturation section (collapsible)

One row per active harmony node. Each row shows a color swatch (the node’s hue) and a saturation multiplier slider.

node saturation sliders

Saturation multiplier for colors near the corresponding harmony node.

100 % (default): saturation is unchanged.
< 100 %: desaturates colors near this node, proportionally to their Gaussian proximity.
> 100 %: boosts saturation near this node.

The effect is weighted by the pixel’s Gaussian proximity to the node and further modulated by neutral color protection so near-achromatic pixels are spared. At the node itself (maximum weight) the saturation is multiplied by exactly the slider value.

🔗Usage guide

🔗Basic workflow

When the module is first activated it is in a neutral state and so there will be no visible change in the image.

Set the anchor hue. Use the eyedropper to pick the dominant or most important color in the scene — a sky, a garment, a skin tone — or drag the slider manually while watching the swatch strip.
Choose a harmony rule. For portraiture, complementary (subject vs. background) or analogous (warm tones) are natural starting points. For landscapes, triad or split complementary often work well. Enable vectorscope two-way sync (under the harmony rule heading) to see the palette on the vectorscope while you choose.
Raise pull strength. Start around 0.2–0.3. The effect is graduated.
Adjust pull width if needed. If many off-palette hues are not moving enough, widen the zones. If you want to correct only specific hue ranges without touching the rest, narrow them. The result may be very subtle if the image already has an inherent harmony and the module is set to match. In this case, setting both strength and width to their maximum values and then reducing them gradually may be a more effective strategy.
Use neutral color protection to taste. Raise it for images with many desaturated tones (architecture, faded film looks) to exempt pastels and muted tones from correction.
Use the saturation section for palette polishing. Once the hue pull is set, open the saturation section to boost or calm chroma per node — e.g. boost the warm nodes and desaturate the cool ones for a cinematic split-tone look.

🔗Custom harmony mode

Use custom when none of the geometric rules match the image’s intended palette.

Set the harmony rule to custom. The previous rule’s node positions are copied as a starting point.
Use nodes to select how many palette targets you need (2–4).
Drag each node’s hue slider or use its eyedropper to position nodes at the desired palette hues.
Raise pull strength to pull off-palette colors toward the custom nodes.

Custom nodes are synced to the vectorscope as free-floating angle markers (the vectorscope shows no standard rule name for custom palettes).

🔗Working with the vectorscope

With vectorscope two-way sync enabled, the vectorscope overlays the harmony guide on the image’s color distribution. Colors inside the guide arcs are on-palette; colors outside are being corrected. Use this to verify the pull is moving in the intended direction. Aside from using the hue slider the anchor hue can be moved by scrolling with the cursor over the vectorscope.

To start from a palette already set in the vectorscope panel, click the import from vectorscope button ( ).