As with most things in KiCad, it’s a bit harder than it looks…I actually have background color implemented, except it doesn’t work in OpenGL for some reason I don’t understand and I’ve passed it along to someone more familiar with OpenGL…
Yes and no. The colors themselves aren’t modified, but the layers are slightly transparent by default, so the black background shows through a bit. You can change the opacity of the selected layer with { and }.
Ok, fine. I guessed that it was kinda complicated…
@c4757p I pasted the color numbers into your palette, so if other people want to try it out it’s a bit easier.
Thanks again,
Carlo
Thse color make colourful experience! Good to have more choice. I read somewhere in forum , kicad try to move feature toward to opengl. So it good these color theme also transfer too 
Thank you! I didn’t do that yet because I don’t really consider the palette complete - I still want to pick colors for things like vias, and make sure everything is clear against the background once I get background color working. But I will make sure to add these in any updates as well.
For what it’s worth, on Linux the color picker can select a color from anywhere on the screen, so you can just click directly on the image to select the colors. Is that not available on Windows or macOS?
WoW, I will add it to the list “Things that I don’t know about linux”!
Ciao,
Carlo
EDIT:
For clarity, the list should be called “Things that i don’t know about GTK or wxGTK”
More specifically either GTK or wxGTK.
Hey, does anyone know where the equivalent ~/.config/kicad/xxx lives on a mac? I was hoping it was in the same place or some place under the /Applications/kicad directory, but I can’t seem to find it. Just trying to sync between a few different computers. I somehow have different schematic fields on my mac vs my linux machines… I’m thinking I will link them to a common file living on dropbox, thus: make a change on one machine, it changes everywhere:)
~/Library/Preferences/kicad/
Here’s pcbnew color scheme as config file contents
ColorPCBLayer_F.Cu=rgb(221, 47, 44)
ColorPCBLayer_In1.Cu=rgb(106, 34, 3)
ColorPCBLayer_In2.Cu=rgb(182, 138, 0)
ColorPCBLayer_In3.Cu=rgb(103, 15, 60)
ColorPCBLayer_In4.Cu=rgb(45, 49, 121)
ColorPCBLayer_In5.Cu=rgb(33, 140, 211)
ColorPCBLayer_In6.Cu=rgb(16, 93, 88)
ColorPCBLayer_B.Cu=rgb(134, 154, 0)
ColorPCBLayer_B.Adhes=rgb(0, 182, 88)
ColorPCBLayer_F.Adhes=rgb(101, 255, 130)
ColorPCBLayer_B.Paste=rgb(38, 162, 153)
ColorPCBLayer_F.Paste=rgb(134, 224, 217)
ColorPCBLayer_B.SilkS=rgb(132, 149, 151)
ColorPCBLayer_F.SilkS=rgb(239, 233, 214)
ColorPCBLayer_B.Mask=rgb(212, 51, 131)
ColorPCBLayer_F.Mask=rgb(230, 135, 181)
ColorPCBLayer_Dwgs.User=rgb(253, 247, 228)
ColorPCBLayer_Cmts.User=rgb(88, 111, 118)
ColorPCBLayer_Eco1.User=rgb(99, 73, 4)
ColorPCBLayer_Eco2.User=rgb(120, 15, 12)
ColorPCBLayer_Edge.Cuts=rgb(207, 238, 0)
ColorPCBLayer_Margin=rgb(63, 74, 0)
ColorPCBLayer_B.CrtYd=rgb(204, 74, 15)
ColorPCBLayer_F.CrtYd=rgb(241, 155, 119)
ColorPCBLayer_B.Fab=rgb(182, 138, 0)
ColorPCBLayer_F.Fab=rgb(255, 219, 101)
ColorTxtFrontEx=rgb(194, 194, 194)
ColorTxtBackEx=rgb(0, 0, 132)
ColorTxtInvisEx=rgb(132, 132, 132)
ColorAnchorEx=rgb(0, 0, 132)
ColorPadBackEx=rgb(0, 132, 0)
ColorPadFrontEx=rgb(132, 0, 0)
ColorViaThruEx=rgb(194, 194, 194)
ColorViaBBlindEx=rgb(132, 132, 0)
ColorViaMicroEx=rgb(0, 132, 132)
ColorNonPlatedEx=rgb(194, 194, 0)
ColorRatsEx=rgb(255, 255, 255)
I still want to tweak a couple things, but this will do for now. Probably will see about including it with KiCad itself when we finally have a way to load color schemes from files.
@c4757p very big thx for the job. Her my wired color scheme in eeschema… I will test your pcbnew scheme right now 
Here is my color scheme for eeschema. Not all Attributes have new colors yet.
ColorWireEx=rgb(131, 148, 150)
ColorBusEx=rgb(0, 0, 132)
ColorConnEx=rgb(131, 148, 150)
ColorLLabelEx=rgb(133, 153, 0)
ColorHLabelEx=rgb(132, 132, 0)
ColorGLabelEx=rgb(132, 0, 0)
ColorPinNumEx=rgb(238, 232, 213)
ColorPinNameEx=rgb(0, 132, 132)
ColorFieldEx=rgb(64, 128, 128)
ColorReferenceEx=rgb(38, 139, 210)
ColorValueEx=rgb(203, 75, 22)
ColorNoteEx=rgb(110, 123, 131)
ColorBodyEx=rgb(238, 232, 213)
ColorBodyBgEx=rgb(7, 54, 66)
ColorNetNameEx=rgb(132, 132, 132)
ColorPinEx=rgb(238, 232, 213)
ColorSheetEx=rgb(132, 0, 132)
ColorSheetFileNameEx=rgb(132, 132, 0)
ColorSheetNameEx=rgb(0, 132, 132)
ColorSheetLabelEx=rgb(132, 132, 0)
ColorNoConnectEx=rgb(0, 0, 132)
ColorErcWEx=rgb(0, 132, 0)
ColorErcEEx=rgb(132, 0, 0)
ColorGridEx=rgb(88, 110, 117)
ColorBgCanvasEx=rgb(0, 43, 54)
@Zh4ng and @c4757p thank you for your share setting.
Well guy I’ve problem,on windows kicad 4.0.6 I can’t use format like this:
ColorBgCanvasEx=rgb(0, 43, 54) not work but ColorBgCanvasEx=Black or other like Gray 1, Gray2 … is working.
When I use rgb(…) then it reset to White color or other it’s default. It just like this format not valid. Any solution?
It’s probably in the nightlies only (beta testing versions for non-developers) until v5 comes out. v4.xx versions are bugfixes without feature additions since v4 came out.
Can confirm this. This is an upcoming feature that will be present in 5.0, and you can use it in development builds as well.
Usual disclaimer for development builds applies: they’re for testing and preview only. Development builds contain features that aren’t finished yet. They’re buggy and may make demons fly out your nose. There is at least one known bug already with this very feature, in fact.
I see I’ll find some pc to test it anyway.
Meanwhile look forward to see this new theme-color setting feature 
I don’t want to highjack this thread, but in the nightlies is it also possible to change the attribute text colours along the bottom of the window?
By that I mean (in eeschema): Reference, Value, Component etc that show along the bottom of the application window whenever you select an item.
I use Ubuntu with a dark theme (that is, a dark GTK theme). This means that the window elements are dark, so the dark coloured text is difficult to read (see image).
I can’t find any way to change these colours, unfortunately the “colour scheme” settings don’t seem to have options for them. Any other places I could look?
Thanks.
That is not possible, no.
Okay thanks, I’ll add a feature request.
Where can i change the color of the frame in eeschema and pcbnew or what’s the value in the configs?