Colour Theory - Part 3 and 4

Colour and contrast - Part 3;

Core set of principles, that we are setting our colour theory on, showing the primarys and secondary's of additive colour systems and subtractive systems. Light contains different wavelengths, this is why this is true. This is the system of how we perceive colour.

Blue is the weaker wavelength, and red is the stronger one, which is why we perceive the colours that we do.

Presentation notes;

The eye contains two kinds of receptors: rods and cones. While the rods convey shades of gray, the cones allow the brain to perceive color hues. Of the three types of cones, the first is sensitive to red-orange light, the second to green light and the third to blue-violet light. When a single cone is stimulated, the brain perceives the corresponding color. That is, if our green cones are stimulated, we see "green". Or if our red-orange cones are stimulated, we see "red". If both our green and red-orange cones are simultaneously stimulated, our perception is yellow. The eye cannot differentiate between spectral yellow, and some combination of red and green. The same effect accounts for our perception of cyan, magenta, and the other in-between spectral colors. Because of this physiological response, the eye can be "fooled" into seeing the full range of visible colors through the proportionate adjustment of just three colors: red, green and blue. Our eyes are fooling the brain into seeing all the different colours.

Anything that we see is based on a process of differentiation.

Contrast of tone;
Formed by the juxtaposition of light and dark values. This could be monochromatic. And uses rods.

The basic for of differentiation and contrast.

These are the tonal values of the colour wheel. Even without the cromatic value, we can still perceive the difference.

Highest contrast is between black and white. When talking about contrast you are looking at high mid and low contrast.

The black and white are equidistant, therefore they are about the same with the readablibity and legibility. Therefore the grey word is harder to read as they have less distance apart, and they are both at a mid contrast.

Blue jumps out at you as they are very far apart that's how colour can have a tonal value, as the orange on the red almost fades into one another.

Contrast of Hue;
Formed by the juxtaposing of different hues. The greater the distance between hues on a colour wheel, the greater the contrast.

Equal level of contrast between them. Yellow is the brightest, but in terms of the background, the blue comes forward the most, its the darkest colour on the lightest background.

Shifting the background allows the yellow to come forward as it is the lightest and brightest, tone and hue working together to find the colour that impacts the most.

This is pure contrast of hue, sitting them next to each other so they contrast. Active contract between the lightest and the darkest.

The contrast of hue and the contrast of tone allows different colours to come out on different backgrounds. High contrast is where something stands out, low contrast is where something blends in.

Contrast of saturation;

Formed by the juxtaposition of light and dark values and their relative saturations.

See it as blue because its the bluest thing there.

Introducing something that is more saturation it makes it richer and darker.

Chramatic value of tone hue and saturation changes our perception of a colour.

Adding a blue in the middle makes the other blues look less blue as they are desaturated.

Contrast of extension;
Formed by assigning proportional field sizes in relation to the visual weight of a colour. Also known as the contrast of proportion.
Interpretation of blue being heavier as its darker.

Thinking about balancing or imbalancing(something blending in or standing out).
A certain proportion of one colour will balance another, you can use different amounts of each colour to balance them out.

A lot of yellow and a small amount of violet is comfortable to look at it is very balanced.

Simply by having the same amount of violet but separating it to make lines, it makes this very uneasy for the eyes and very uncomfortable, therefore this is unbalanced and almost looks like it is wobbling.

Complimentary colours do not go together, they don't work very well and are uneasy on the eyes, as they have such a high contrast.

Contrast of temperature;
Formed by juxtaposing hues that can be considered 'warm' or 'cool'. Also known as the contrast of warm and cool.

Blue is the coolest and orange is the warmest colour this is because blue and orange are complimentary colours.

With the black lines in between the colours you can see that they are all block, although when you remove the black lines you can see that the colours look like they have a gradient to them, where actually they are block colours. This is because of the contrast from the colour next to it, for example the violet brings out the blue in that side to show that it is more violet.

Complementary contrast;
Formed by juxtaposing complementary colours from a colour wheel or perceptual opposites.

Looking at certain colours like this, for example the complimentary colours, it starts to hurt the eyes and looks like the images are vibrating.

The red has a higher contrast on this image, this is because the background colour is green, which is reds complimentary colour, therefore it stood out more than the other colours.

Whereas on this image the blue stands out more, and has a higher contrast as orange is the colour of the background and blues complimentary colour.

With these it shows that having writing on top of a background which is its complimentary colour makes the writing not readable and illegible, therefore when using colour with type avoid using their complimentary colour as their background.

Simultaneous contrast;
Formed when boundaries between colours perceptually vibrate.

As the yellow is made up of red and green, it means that red will always be there as the green will draw the red out of the yellow as it is its complimentary colour.

When looking at this and staring at the yellow the grey between the yellow starts to become violet, and the grey between the blue starts to become orange, or it is seen to be perceived as these colours as they are the complimentary colours for yellow and blue, although it is actually the middle colour grey all the way through. This is why you can't trust what we are seeing in relation to colour.

Subjective colour - Part 4;

This is clear what it says, as there is a high contrast between the word and the background as they are complimentary colours, therefore the yellow is very clear as it is bright and stands out on its passive violet background.

Whereas this is slightly harder to read as you see the counters in the text before you see the word itself, this is because although the colours are balanced, the yellow is a lot brighter therefore stands out a lot more in contrast to its passive violet type.

This process has changed the way in which you see the colours as they are all saturated versions of yellow although adding more changes the way we perceive the colours.

Neutral colours are effected by the colours that surround it, they start to bring out the complimentary colours of the colours surrounding it. As this shows, what looks to be a desaturated blue in the orange and a desaturated orange in the blue, it is actually the same neutral grey.