Colored text (LaTeX2e unofficial reference manual (November 2018))

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#### 21.3.2 Colored text

Synopses:

    \textcolor{name}{...}
    \textcolor[color model]{color specification}{...}

or

    \color{name}
    \color[color model]{specification}

The affected text gets the color. This line

    \textcolor{magenta}{My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:}
    Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!

causes the first half to be in magenta while the rest is in black. You can use a color declared with `\definecolor` in exactly the same way that we just used the builtin color ‘`magenta`’.

    \definecolor{MidlifeCrisisRed}{rgb}{1.0,0.11,0.0}
    I'm thinking about getting a \textcolor{MidlifeCrisisRed}{sports car}.

The two `\textcolor` and `\color` differ in that the first is a command form, enclosing the text to be colored as an argument. Often this form is more convenient, or at least more explicit. The second form is a declaration, as in `The moon is made of {\color{green} green} cheese`, so it is in effect until the end of the current group or environment. This is sometimes useful when writing macros or as below where it colors everything inside the `center` environment, including the vertical and horizontal lines.

    \begin{center} \color{blue}
      \begin{tabular}{l|r}
        UL &UR \\ \hline
        LL &LR
      \end{tabular}
    \end{center}

You can use color in equations. A document might have this definition in the preamble

    \definecolor{highlightcolor}{RGB}{225,15,0}

and then contain this equation.

    \begin{equation}
      \int_a^b \textcolor{highlightcolor}{f'(x)}\,dx=f(b)-f(a)
    \end{equation}

Typically the colors used in a document are declared in a class or style but sometimes you want a one-off. Those are the second forms in the synopses.

    Colors of \textcolor[rgb]{0.33,0.14,0.47}{Purple} and
    {\color[rgb]{0.72,0.60,0.37} Gold} for the team.

The format of color specification depends on the color model (see Color models). For instance, while `rgb` takes three numbers, `gray` takes only one.

    The selection was \textcolor[gray]{0.5}{grayed out}.

Colors inside colors do not combine. Thus

    \textcolor{green}{kind of \textcolor{blue}{blue}}

has a final word that is blue, not a combination of blue and green.

Unofficial LaTeX2e reference manual