Color

Color is a fascinating subject, touching on physics, physiology, psychology, art, and philosopy. Here I am keeping some notes and references on color.

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“Unique colors” based on the opponent-process model of human color vision from an article by Kuehni. The colors shown are approximations in the sRGB color space to the Munsell values 5R5/14, 5G6/8, 5Y8/10, 5PB5/12, N9, and N1. The background is N5. Approximate sRGB values are from Werth's Virtual Munsell Color Wheel.

Here are some interesting sites and articles:

  1. The Dimensions of Colour, modern colour theory by David Briggs of the Australian National Art School.
  2. color vision by Bruce MacEvoy. His handprint.com website has many interesting things, including a section on watercolors.
  3. Opticks by Sir Isaac Newton. From Project Gutenberg.
  4. Cochrane, S. (2014). The Munsell Color System: A scientific compromise from the world of art. Studies in History and Philosophy of Science, 47, 26-41. (Full-text available via Cornette Library.)
  5. Kuehni, R. (2014). Unique hues and their stimuli—state of the art. Color Research & Application, 39(3), 279-287. (Full-text available via Cornette Library.)
  6. Modern Chromatics by Ogden Rood (1879). Modern printed facsimile in the Cornette Library at ND 1488.R66 1879a.
  7. A Color Notation (ebook, public domain, 1905) by Albert Henry Munsell. There is a print copy of the 1919 Third edition in the Cornette Library at ND 1488.M9 1919.
  8. A Grammar of Color Munsell and Cleland, 1921, online version at The Munsell Color Company. Cornette Library also has a reprint of this, but with fewer color pages.
  9. Landa, E. R. (2004). ALBERT H. MUNSELL: A SENSE OF COLOR AT THE INTERFACE OF ART AND SCIENCE. Soil Science, 169(2), 83-89. (Full-text available via Cornette Library.)
  10. Andrew Werth's Virtual Munsell Color Wheel.
  11. Munsell Color Palette
  12. Munsell and the Color of Flesh (Munsell Color Blog) Humans are basically orange (shades of Munsell YR.)
  13. Lch and Lab colour gradient picker by David Johnstone. The Lch (CIELCH) color system has a chroma scale and a lightness scale similar to Munsell's value scale, but is based on RYGB hues 90° apart in a cylindrical color space.

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Some random human skin colors. These cover the range of Munsell colors: Hue: 2.5-7.5 YR, Value: 2-7, Chroma 2-4. A high-chroma shade of YR is called “orange” in modern English. Appearance will vary with your monitor's color balance.