I've recently learned that a way to find a colour palette of complimentary colours I can use a tool such as the Adobe Kuler. In my practice of work I have always used colour boards and the eyedropper tool to select colours from an image and choose them by how I think they look. I do enjoy making colour boards but now I will be able to select colours that I know work well together.
This is an example of a contemporary colour scheme where all the shades compliment each other. This could be used for anything from a web layout to a clothing range colour scheme.
Another tool is Paletton, which looks like this
Laura Olivia