Sources
Help build the largest human-edited directory on the web.
Submit a site - Become an editor
Wikipedia. Licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License.
Are you an expert in this subject? Join the discussion and share your knowledge at Wikipedia.org.
Color wheel
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 |
It has been suggested that color circle be merged into this article or section. (Discuss) |
|
|
It has been suggested that tertiary color be merged into this article or section. (Discuss) |
 |
This article does not cite any references or sources. (August 2007) Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unverifiable material may be challenged and removed. |
A color wheel or color circle is an organization of color hues around a circle, showing relationships between colors considered to be primary colors, secondary colors, complementary colors, etc.
Artists typically use red, yellow, and blue primaries (RYB color model), so these are arranged at three equally-spaced points around the color wheel, as they typically call it. Printers and others who use modern subtractive color methods and terminology use magenta, yellow, and cyan as subtractive primaries.
Color scientists and psychologists often use additive primaries, such as red, green, and blue, and often refer to their arrangement around a circle as a color circle, as opposed to a color wheel. This is approximately the form of color circle invented by Isaac Newton.
Intermediate and interior points of color wheels and circles represent color mixtures. In a paint or subtractive color wheel, the center is usually (but not always[1]) black, representing all colors of light being absorbed; in a color circle, on the other hand, the center is white or gray, indicating a mixture of different wavelengths of light (all wavelengths, or two complementary colors, for example).
Some sources use the terms color wheel and color circle interchangeably.
Contents |
Typical artists' paint or pigment primary colors are blue, red, and yellow. The corresponding secondary colors are green, orange & violet. The tertiary colors are red–orange, red–violet, yellow–orange, yellow–green, blue–violet and blue–green.
A color wheel based on RGB (red, green, blue) additive primaries has cyan, magenta, and yellow secondaries. Alternatively, the same arrangement of colors around a circle can be described as based on cyan, magenta, and yellow subtractive primaries, with red, green, and blue being secondaries.
Goethe's Theory of Colors was one attempt to define a color wheel and color theory based on experimental and philosophical principles.
Color schemes are logical combinations of colors on the color wheel.
- ^ Martha Gill (2000). Color Harmony Pastels: A Guidebook for Creating Great Color Combinations. Rockport Publishers. ISBN 1564967204.
 |
This color-related article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |
