The homology systems that make-up the color patterns of butterflies and moths have been extensively studied in developmental and evolutionary contexts. Yet, a case can be made that the field has been slow to advance in recent years, due to an over-emphasis on techniques borrowed from model-systems biology, and a coincident decline in the formulation of synthetic hypotheses. This project aims to demonstrate the continued relevance of theoretical and comparative methods for color pattern research, and evolutionary developmental biology more generally. The overarching objective is to show that the growth dynamics that give rise to wing size and shape play an important role in determining the overall topology of color patterns. A key prediction is that the secretory sources that are responsible for pigmenting pattern homologs have a regular spatial positioning that is correlated with the locations of vein junctions and termini. When the arrangement of these morphological landmarks varies, pattern homologs can fuse or discretize, with no up- or down-regulation of the associated pigment synthesis pathways. The proposed ‘dynamic canvas model’ has the potential to advance our understanding of wing patterns by clarifying the role that physiological processes such as allometry, scaling, and growth play in their development and evolution. The study of these mechanisms will provide insight into the evolvability of insect color patterns, which in turn, could help to elucidate the conceptual and empirical basis of character evolvability in other taxa.