Color Interactions

Our eyes are funny things. We can only take in a certain amount of information when we look at something. Above is an example of tricking our eyes in a color interaction study by Josef Albers. The smallest squares are the same color exactly, but when they are put against different backgrounds they appear to be different. Throughout the entire color exploration section in this semester I found that I made my eyes realize what was there instead of just assuming what I thought was there. For example I had t train my eyes to see a pure gray when we were mixing grays. A slight tint that was too warm or too cool was what I aimed to differentiate. Before that in the activity where we had to find steps between tints and shades was a test on my eyes to see contrast instead of what I thought it should be in my mind.

In the color interaction activities all that I have learned about color is reversed. I have learned how to train my eyes to see color steps and variations of color and know what the content was of those specific colors. In this activity, I had to trick myself and use color interactions to disprove that my eyes were really trained.

Color Theory- The Chromatic Gray

Our assignment was to use our basic color wheel and non-color wheel colors and mix together the complements, or at least what seemed to be compliments of each other. these colors at some proportion should have canceled each other's hue at maximum intensity to make a neutral gray. The whole process was overall a learning experience. I found that different hues were a lot stronger than others. Between Phthalocyanine Blue (Green shade) and the Ultramarine Blue, the latter needed a lot more paint with it's compliment to be effective. The fact that it was a green shade for the Phthalocyanine Blue made one row completely green until the end where I got to neutralize the gray.

My earlier research on how gray acts like blue or purple really helped me be aware of how to look for an actual neutral gray instead of a cooler gray that also looked correct. I found it was a lot easier to identify when a gray was too warm. In my prior research I found that blue and purples are overall stronger hues since their chroma has more steps than the warmer colors. There maximum intensity seems darker and acts like black would when added to white. The human eye doesn't care that black isn't on the color wheel, it just perceives a darker cooler color. This is why it was difficult to identify if my grays were in fact neutral instead of blueish.

The last part of our assignment was to paint a chromatic gray painting completely silver object. I found it extremely difficult to match up grays that were warmer or cooler according to what I saw. Also it was difficult to outline areas of different gray values when it came to small sections and points of the overhead light reflecting on my flask. The contrast of grays was also hard to capture. Overall it was two tedious activities but I enjoyed them.

Applicator of color to the blank face of the world!

Enough about boring color theory for a moment. Now it's time to talk about applying all we learned boys and girls. Exhibit "A" would be an adventure to a restaurant named Wasabi. It is a sushi restaurant that has a conveyerbelt where plates comes out with the different dishes. The tricky part is that the plates are different colors to signify what the price is for that certain plate. There are yellow, orange, red, blue, and violet plates that come out of that small door to sushi paradise at the ends of the conveyerbelt. Sounds great, right? Wrong. Luckily I was in the restaurant with a fellow class mate. The difference between the most costly $6 violet plate at the $4.50 red plate was hard to distinguish. After a few dozen plates went by we started to recognize which of the red/violet plates had more blue content. By comparing we saved some money and also applied our comparison skills on the yellow and orange plates to see which had more red content. We tried to save money by using these skills, but our hunger, mainly mine, made trying to save money kind of difficult.

The next wonderful color application exhibit "B" came at my job. Our baker Yasmin was trying to figure out how to make the correct colors of green and browns to create camouflage icing on a cake. She had a green that was a blue-green and a color that looked like a tint of sienna. She needed one more color to make good spots for camouflage. I suggested taking some of her green icing and adding some red into it. She looked at me like I was crazy, but she trusted me. We sat there adding dots of red, folding them in each time and waiting to see what color came out before adding more. It turned a beautiful brown that fit perfectly with the other chosen icing. She told me that she would ask me from them on if she needed color consultation.


There you have it, color theory in action. James and I experienced color in our sushi dinner. The warm colored plates were less expensive, which helped appeal to my appetite, which didn't help my bill after I ate so many of them. Icing is a vehicle of used for the food coloring so that Yasmin can make all sorts of works of art on her cakes.

Bottom line, color theory use is everywhere.



Picture of wasabi plates: http://www.washingtonian.com/articles/bestbites/3557.html

HARMonious color

Harmony is a balance which is said to be pleasing to the eye, but really it is the pleasing to the mind. Harmony is achieved, in the sense of color, when there is a balance that lets our minds organize what is going on (Morton). Being visually unbalanced doesn’t just refer to complicated compositions, but also refers to compositions that lack enough information to be engaging. In our activity we have to creating nine compositions with the first row of three consisting of tints, tones, and shades. The second row of three will consist of compositions using a hue to complimentary scale. And lastly the third row of three will consist of compositions using analogous colors to my choice hue, red.

So lets talk about color harmony and interactions. Our eyes enjoy contrast, just like light and dark balance each other complimentary colors balance each other. These colors do this because they are colors that do not share any of the same colors, therefore they are distinguished from each other without a reasonable doubt. Contrast is harmonious because it shows the most stability (Morton). When colors are closely analogous they seem to be stable because they share a common hue. But there is a point where this can be extremely boring and then harmony is broken because of lack of a organized and stimulating composition. In doing the first row of compositions it’s important to understand that contrast is needed to stimulate the composition in being harmonious. The second row follows the same guidelines that contrast and stimulation should be exemplified. The difference is that this time it is using the complements and not the contrast of white and black. Then the last row, being free to use analogous colors, has to have carefully picked colors so that the row doesn’t fall into the realm of being inharmonious due to the lack of interesting combinations.

Why does this matter? Quite honestly I was just trying to write a blog before I had to do my compositions just to have it done with. But in my quest to “just to whatever” I have found that practicing color combinations before I put them down permanently is important so that I achieve consistent harmony.


Citation:
Morton, J.L. “COLOR THEORY” Color Matters is a registered trademark of J.L. Morton. Graphics and Text: Copyright (c) 1995-2008 http://www.colormatters.com/colortheory.html

Why does Gray act like Blue?

After doing the color scales in class using tints (white), tones (grays), and shades (black) a question that I pose is why is it when gray is added to a hue does it look like a blue was added. When I put the tones next to the hue, tints, and shades they appeared to have a purple hue, as if blue was added instead of gray. There are two ideas that I have found to that build on each other to tell me why gray can act like a blue, or cool color, instead of a warm color like yellow or red.

The first thought that I had was how humans perceive color like they take in their other senses. It is said that color is seen in opposites such as blue and yellow that are never identified together, like how cold and warm are identified separately (Douma). Gray is a neutral color that is dull that doesn't seem warm at all. Therefore when I perceive gray I feel like it would be cool and calm like a shade of blue would be. This is not enough to explain why gray can look blue or purple.

A more concrete explanation of my question would be in the Munsell Color System. The system is an "egg" shaped color diagram where absolute neutral gray is in the middle and as it goes out towards the edge the colors hue becomes more and more intense until at the edge when it reaches the full color saturation (SpecialChem). So if the gray is right in the middle, why does the gray still lean towards blue? The answer would be that "red, purple, and blue are considered to be stronger hues that have a higher chroma (SpecialChem)." Higher chroma that these colors are more intense than yellows and greens. The yellow and greens actually achieve full color saturation closer to the middle, so the rest of the chroma towards the edge does not intensify (Special Chem). In conclusion I believe that gray seems more like a blue or cool color than a warm color because of Munsell's explanation that purple and blue are more intense colors in general than yellow.


Citation:

Douma, Michael, curator. “What is Color?” Color Vision & Art. 2007. WebExhibits. Institute for Dynamic Educational Advancement, Washington, DC. February 12, 2008.

"Color Center>> Color Handbook: Munsell Color System." SpecialChem S.A.20008. Special Chem Innovations and Solutions in Coating and Ink. http://www.specialchem4coatings.com/home/aboutus/index.aspx February 14, 2008

the color wheel is intuitively WRONG

According to the Institute for Dynamic Educational Advancement (IDEA) through their “Web Exhibits” project, people have “color senses in their sight like they have taste senses (Douma).” They go onto say that in our perception of color we identify two pairs of colors which are red and green and then blue and yellow, where we never see both at the same time(Douma). The pairing of the two then appear to be a completely different color where the base colors are not separately identified. This is relevant to the activity of making a color wheel because can can compare the placement of the red and green combination as well as the blue and yellow combination.

Blue and yellow are both Primary Colors that are not exactly opposite but are not analogous colors, meaning that they do not share colors. As soon as they are put together the product becomes a step of green. On the color wheel we can see the steps that are between yellow and blue, especially the pure green that is the midpoint of yellow and blue. Even though the closest to yellow might be described as “yellow-green” it’s mainly considered green and not identified with blue.

Red and Green are respectively a primary color and a secondary color. On the color wheel we can see that they are opposites, or complimentary colors to each other. Even though they hold different ranks they are like yellow and blue because they are not analogous. Red and green make a brown color when they are put together, and that is what sets them apart from blue and yellow. Red and green make brown which is not on the color wheel, yellow and blue make green which is on the color wheel, so why do our eyes identify these instead of the pairs that are both consistently opposite? Why do we not see orange instead of yellow? According to Ewald Hering, a physiologist, we perceive the sense of color like we perceive other senses by identifying opposites. These opposites are like identifying hot and cold or sweet and bitter (Douma). We perceive those colors as separately unrelated and almost opposite because our senses relate them that way. The color wheel may be scientifically correct to show opposites, but our senses “see” things different.



Citation:
Douma, Michael, curator. “What is Color?” Color Vision & Art. 2007. WebExhibits. Institute for Dynamic Educational Advancement, Washington, DC. February 12, 2008.

Color in Context

The "Authorized Parking Only" sign is an excellent example of color being used to imply the purpose of the sign. The bright yellow is an "advancing" color, which is appropriate since the sign is suppose to act as a warning for the public. The black lettering that is all capitalized also exhibits the urgent need to have a viewer pay attention to the sign. This color of the yellow is especially eye catching because of it's high saturation.



The fire hydrant on the other hand is a poor example of color choice to compliment the object's function. A fire hydrant is an important apparatus that needs to stand out in urgent situations. The color of the hydrant being green does not reflect the general red or yellow uniform of the fire departments personnel and equipment, which are the socially accepted as the colors of important emergency aid. The shade of green brings down the saturation making the hydrant a dull color that blends into it's environment.

Both of these objects are important in the community, but their color choice makes their appearance of importance vary.