Color Flashcards
A phenomenon of light and visual perception that may be described in terms of an individual’s perception of hue, saturation and lightness for objects, and hue, saturation and brightness for light sources.
Color
The distribution of energy emitted by a radiant source, arranged in order of wavelengths especially the band of colors produced when sunlight is refracted and dispersed by a prism, comprising red, orange, yellow, green blue, indigo, and violet.
Spectrum
Designating a color having high lightness and low saturation.
Pale
Designnating a color having high lightness and strong saturation.
Brilliant
A system for specifying colors arranged in three orderly scales of uniform visual steps according to hue, chroma, and value, developed in 1898 by Albert H. Munsell. Hue extends in a rotary direction about a central axis through a spectrum of five major and five secondary hues. Value extends vertically direction from black at the bottom through a series of grays to white at the top. Chroma extends radially from the central axis at which saturation is zero, out to the strongest saturation attainable for each color’s hue and value.
Munsell System
One of the three dimensions of color: the property of light by which the color of an object is classified as being red, yellow, green or blue or an intermediate between any contiguous pair of these colors.
Hue
One of the three dimensions of color, the purity or vividness of a hue.
Saturation or Intensity
The degree by which a color differs from a gray of the same lightness or brightness, corresponding to saturation of the perceived color.
Chroma
Designating a color having low lightness and strong saturation.
Deep
Designating a color having low lightness and low saturation, and reflecting only a small fraction of incident light.
Dark
The perceived color of an object, determined by the wavelengths of the light reflected from its surface after selective absorption of other wavelengths of the incident light.
Reflected Color
A scale of achromatic colors having several, usually ten, equal gradations ranging from white to black.
Gray Scale
The dimension of color by which an object appears to reflect more or less of the incident light, varying from black to white for surface colors and from black to colorless for transparent volume colors.
Lightness
The degree by which a color appears to reflect more or less of the incident light, corresponding to lightness of the perceived color.
Value
The dimension of a color that is correlated with luminance and by which visual stimuli are ordered continuously from very dim to very bright. Pure white has the maximum brightness and pure black the minimum brightness.
Brightness
The absorption of a certain wavelengths of the light incident on a colored surface, the remaining portion being reflected or transmitted.
Selective Absorption
A color produced by mixing cyan, yellow, and magenta pigments, each of which absorbs certain wavelengths. A balanced mixture of these colorant or subtractive primaries theoretically yields black since it absorbs all wavelengths of visible light.
Subtractive Color
A color produced by combining lights of red, green and blue wavelengths. These light or additive primaries contain all the wavelengths necessary to produce a colorless or white light.
Additive Color
The merging of juxtaposed dots or strokes of pure colors when seen from a distance to produce a hue often more luminous than that available from a premixed pigment.
Optical Mixing
Designating a color inclined toward or dominated by red, orange or yellow.
Warm
Designating a color inclined toward or dominated by green, blue or violet.
Cool
A circular scale of the colors of the spectrum, showing complementary colors opposite each other.
Color Wheel or Color Circle
Any of a set of colors such as red, yellow and blue, regarded as generating all other colors.
Primary Color
A color, such as orange, green, or violet, produced by mixing two primary colors.
Secondary Colors
A color, such as brown, produced by mixing two secondary colors, or a secondary color with one of its constituent primaries.
Tertiary Color
A warm color that appears to move toward an observel, giving an illusion of space.
Advancing Color
A cool color that appears to move away from an observer, giving an illusion of space.
Receding Color
One of a pair of opposing colors on a color wheel, perceived as completing or enhancing each other.
Complementary Color
A combination of three colors forming an equilateral triangle on a color wheel.
Triad
A combination of one color and the pair of colors adjoining its complementary color on a color wheel.
Split Complementary
A combination of two analogous colors and their complementary colors on a color wheel.
Double Complementary
Having only one color or exhibiting varying intensities and values of a single hue.
Monochromatic
Having or exhibiting a variety of colors.
Polychromatic
An arrangement or pattern of colors conceived of as forming an integrated whole.
Color Scheme
A triangular diagram developed by Faber Birren to describe the relationship between a pure hue, white and black, which combine to yield secondary tints, tones, shades, and grays. All colors may be subjectively conceived as a mixture of the psychological primaries - red, yellow, green and blue - plus the achromatic pair of white and black.
Color Triangle
