In our blog entry on “Visual Analytics with Complementary and Analogous Color Harmony”, we discussed how to build the Munsell Color Wheel and presented Complementary and Analogous  color harmony examples. In today’s blog entry, we highlight how to combine these concepts to  build a complex color harmony for a scientific data visualization of a computationally modeled hurricane.

Applying Analogous Color Harmony to Depict the Ocean:

For our First step, we want to develop an Analogous Color Harmony in the Key of 5PB (Purple  Blue) to depict the ocean where the hurricane will start. Additionally, we want to include a map of the Eastern United States we will use as a reference for the location of the hurricane as it builds and progresses over time. An analogous harmony combines a key color (5PB) with the two colors on either side of it on the Munsell Color Wheel, 5B (Blue) and 5P (Purple). We show these results in Figure 1 below with a small snapshot of our intended visualization. The wind vectors are included for reference for the hurricane build up.

Figure#1: Analogous Color Harmony in the Key of 5PB (Purple Blue) to depict the ocean where the computationally modeled hurricane begins and the surrounding land mass. The analogous harmony combines 5PB and its adjacent colors of 5B and 5P on the Munsell Color Wheel.

Building a Extended Analolgous Color Harmony to Depict the Hurricane:

For our second step, we depict the hurricane as it builds up. We want to show the center of the hurricane and the surrounding less intense elements. To do this, we select two colors on either side of the Analogous Color Harmony in the Key of 5PB. These two colors are 5RP (Red Purple) and 5BG (Blue Green). We use 5BG (Blue Green) to depict the large mass of the hurricane and 5RP (Red Purple) to depict the surrounding less intense cyclone elements. We show these results in Figure 2 below with a small snapshot of the hurricane in our intended visualization. A blue gray color surrounds the eye of the hurricane as the 5RP and 5BG and 5PB colors mix together digitally.

Figure#2: Extending the Analogous Color Harmony in the Key of 5PB (Purple Blue) to include the two colors 5RP (Red Purple) and 5BG (Blue Green) that sit on either side of the 5B, 5PB and 5P family on the Munsell Color Wheel. The center of the hurricane is depicteded in the 5BG color and the surrounding less intense elements are shown in the 5RP color.

Using a Complementary Color Harmony to Depict the Wind Vectors:

Our third and Final step is to use a complementary color harmony to emphasize the wind vectors against the ocean. Two colors that are directly opposite each other on the hue wheel are called complementary colors. For 5B (Blue), the complementary color is 5YR (Yellow Red or Orange). We apply the concept to have a contrasting set of 5YR (Orange) wind vectors against the 5B, 5PB, and 5P analogous color elements in the ocean. We show these results in Figure 3 below with a small snapshot of the wind vectors in the ocean.

Figure#3: The color of the wind vectors in our visualization of the computationally modeled hurricane is selected as 5YR (Yellow Red or Orange). The 5YR color is directly across from the 5B (Blue) color on the Munsell Color Wheel and forms a resullting complementary color harmony. In Munsell Color Space, Orange is defined as Yellow Red.

Combine Color Harmonies to Complete the Hurricane Scientific Visualization:

Figure 4 depicts how the analogous, extended analogous, and complementary color harmonies
combined to complete our scientific data visualization of a computational modeled hurricane. Figure 4 is only one frame from the animation used to depict the build up of the hurricane over time.

Figure#4: The Analogous, Extended Analogous and Complementary Harmonies on the Munsell Color Wheel for our Computationally Modeled Hurricane are summarized.

Summary:

In this short discussion, we have shown how to combine Analogous, Extended Analogous and
Complementary color harmonies for depicting a scientific data visualization of a computationally
modeled hurricane. If you would like to explore this topic further, please examine Chapter 4: Defining Color Harmony of my book on “Applying Color Theory to Digital Media and Visualization” from CRC Press.

About the Author:

Theresa-Marie Rhyne is an expert in the field of computer-generated visualization and a consultant who specializes in applying artistic color theories to visualization and digital media. She has consulted with the Stanford University Visualization Group on a color suggestion prototype system, the Center for Visualization at the University of California at Davis and the Scientific Computing and Imaging Institute at the University of Utah on applying color theory to ensemble data visualization. Follow the link for more information on her book: “Applying Color Theory to Digital Media and Visualization” is available from CRC Press.

Color has always fascinated me. When I was a young girl I was flabbergasted when I’d witness a woman whose outfit combined two different reds. I wondered ~ did she KNOW the colors didn’t “match?” Did she realize it was a huge error in judgement when she chose that outfit? It disturbed me. If I had any clairvoyance, I would have known that those curiosities would fuel me forward to my career.

I made it one of my life’s missions to understand color ~ so I could solve those pesky little mysteries. Now, at this ripe age, the more I learn about color the more I realize a lifetime won’t be enough. In the meantime, I’m happy to live in a world where color drives my daily orbit.

History

My mother was a painter. My father had artistic pursuits. My grandmother was a painter. My aunt was a painter. My uncles were textile collectors. So, I was surrounded by active participation of art my entire life > with an emphasis on color appreciation. I started studying art as a young girl. All my education was directed toward a career in the arts. Every job I’ve ever had was in the visual arts. But a big question continues to puzzle me: Why was there such inadequate color training during my academic education? I learned while on the job. My first job was with a textile silkscreen company. Day one the owner commented that none of the people he’d interviewed for the job came out of art school knowing how to mix colors. Though I got the job, I was solidly in that lackluster group. Fast forward ~ I decided I needed to KNOW more. So, I’ve been on a quest to learn learn learn. While intuition led me to creating “successful” color combinations… I wanted to know WHY or HOW these elements related or worked together.

Throughout my school years I learned color through the primaries of red, blue, and yellow. For over 20 years I worked in publishing where CMYK were my primaries. As I evolved into a surface designer, the PANTONE system became the dominant color system. In the past few years I’ve taken many classes ~ including the Fundamentals of Color Science, twice, through the Munsell Color Science Lab at RIT, to further my knowledge and understanding of how color works.

Career

All of my creative pursuits lead me in the direction of my current career: designing custom carpets. I am third generation in the rug business so I think I was destined to produce carpets. When I was researching carpet manufacturing it was clear that the rugs I wanted to create were woven in Nepal. So, off I went to explore the industry and find a weaver in Nepal. I had a long list of questions about the process and naturally, seamless color communication was high on my list of must-haves. Aside from not speaking English I wanted to know – did we speak the same “color” language?

On my first visit to Nepal I ordered my first collection of rugs. I was instantly using the new pom box to assign colors to the designs.

As I visited different weaving facilities I would ask, “If we work together how would we communicate color?” What color system did they use? One gentleman gave me an odd, quizzical look, tilted his head in confusion. Then he leaned over, picked up a piece of red yarn from the weaving floor and said “you can take this.” Well, I knew I was in trouble. After years of art direction, I couldn’t go backwards. Proper color communication would be an essential ingredient to the success of my new endeavor. Out of the 15 weavers I met, only one of them had an acceptable answer. When I asked about color communication he pulled out a case. In that case lived five trays of color poms (dyed yarn samples) all in chromatic order. I was filled with such delight that in that moment I heard a choir of angels singing.

Here is the dye master at my weaver’s facility. While it appears rustic and antiquated they produce perfect matches every time. In the background, on the left, they are in the process of dying the yarns in large pots over fire.

Each tray was a hue family. Within each tray value and chroma lined up with military precision. This pom box enables me to select colors with confidence.

My pom box has 1200 standard colors in the set.

Process

My job is to meet a client – then look and listen. Quietly, I process all the information I take in. Often it’s simply observing their personal style and what they have to offer consciously or unconsciously. What is the intention? What is needed? What room will the rug live in? Is the room a sanctuary? Does the space need energy? Then I go through the process of interpreting the information into a story which then translates into a color direction and later a design.

This is an example of a carpet with a narrow range of values within the same hue family.
The color yarn chart is what the weavers use for reference as they work.

When creating a design ~ my first consideration is color. Early on it became clear to me that clients have a strong affinity toward color. Everyone has a personal color palette. Once the color direction is established we can move on to pattern ~ which always follows as a distant second element. The pattern won’t register until they see it in a colorway they relate to. Playing with pattern is just a vehicle for color.

GEOLOGY

How much traffic will the rug be subject to? Are there pets? Is the room active? If so, perhaps I use highly chromatic ~ saturated colors. Perhaps use of strong contrast. Complimentary colors. If it’s a quiet and serene direction, say a bedroom, then I consider colors in the same value range or monochromatic colors. The hue family is the dominant piece of information. Where will the accent colors appear? How will the colors relate? Which colors will be the accents? Where is the surprise? Value relationships are critical. I work with tonal shifts which are due to use of silk and the reflective nature of silk. With years of experience I have come to learn how many value steps are needed to effectively separate the areas of color or which will take advantage of the silk.

CIRCUITOUS

Colorways are like little stories. What is the story necessary for any particular job? What do the colors say and how does that relate to the client and their needs? The psychology of color is an important element when creating a living space so I listen carefully to the answers because my carpets are all custom and made-to-order. Clients will live with the rugs every single day so it’s critical that the client is satisfied. Happy weavers make happy carpets and happy carpets make happy clients. That is my goal.

While visiting the weaving facility I was mesmerized by the quantities of surplus yarns left over from all the previous projects.

More Carpets Example

SPEAK

TRAVEL

BEVERLY

The Munsell system is the foundation for color knowledge – as with many of the color systems, understanding the Munsell system is fundamental. Full comprehension the HVC system takes the mystery out of color selection. It allows for more time on the creative side since the workings of color are taken care of. Once you know this system most of the other color systems fall into place.

This HVC exercise sheet is one of my favorites and I use it as a foundation when I teach color workshops. (PS this is a movie)

About the Author

In the X-Rite room at the Munsell Symposium in Boston.

Alicia’s true loves have always been color and texture. Coming from a long line of accomplished artists, her emergence into rug design is thanks to her family. Her Armenian-born grandfather was a renowned Oriental rug authority, uncles continued in his footsteps and were major collectors of international textiles, and Mark Keshishian & Sons, which her grandfather founded decades ago, is managed to this day by her cousin in the Washington, D.C. area. Carpets, art, and color have been part of her life for as long as she can remember: the smell of the wool, the touch of the fibers, and the variety of patterns are in her DNA. She loves to design and carpets are an exciting way to live with design everyday. Visit her website to see more work. 

As I’m siting at my desk with a pencil in my hand, and a search light in my head turned on – I find myself on a quest to find a visual image for my inspiration. It flickers and fades, but I’m like an archeologist, I won’t give up, I’ll be excavating my soul with a sharp pencil and I’ll dig it out. I will bring it to life, give it a shape, and make it visible. I will show others what’s keeps lurking in my head since I was a little girl. I’ll find the way…

I was born in the city of Leningrad, USSR, to my parents who were a graphic designer and an industrial designer. Growing up in my father’s design studio, and helping my mom in many different art jobs she had took over the years, I studied art through after school art classes.

Visual arts in its many different forms were my life. I was brewing in it, and naturally made a choice to be an artist. I loved all things art. All but one. There was a dark spot, a blemish on that planet called Visual Arts. A dissatisfaction. Imbalance. It was forming as I was mixing colors on my palette, but I had no name for it yet. All I knew is that it’s not true, it’s not working…

The pencil is tapping on the piece of paper. I think I see the shadow… a glimpse of the idea that keeps moving. The goal is clear: to capture the correlation between two generations, and between two different fields: the knowledge and the practice. Yes, I can feel a hem of it’s clothes in my hand… I’ll pin it to my paper with the sharp led of my pencil. Done. Captured!

Papier-mâché decor for Masha Hemmergling’s art classroom – stage 1 in progress (pencil, oil pastel, crayon)

Papier-mâché decor for Masha Hemmergling’s art classroom – stage 2 (pencil, oil pastel, crayon)

Papier-mâché decor for Masha Hemmergling’s art classroom – final stage (pencil, oil pastel, crayon)

The A-Ha Moments

My art college was the place I loved the most: surrounded by likeminded young people I was making art all day long, learning new techniques and the step-by-step process of different styles was like opening a door to the unknown adventure.

The magical brush stroke techniques, creative ways of loading the paintbrush with paint, and even the process of mixing colors to make new hues – I loved every part of it! We mixed colors more out of necessity than a desire to experiment: poor art students needed to be creative, right? To buy primary colors plus black and white will save money… but wait, you still have to get purple and green because they’ll never come out right when you’re trying to make them yourself.

Necessity turned into an unexpected discovery – I had unknowingly stepped into the world of chroma. By mixing reds and blacks together I was getting beautiful browns, that were different from browns I would get from mixing reds and greens. Oh, this color world needs more excavating!

The thin pencil line pulls out a shape from an empty sheet, preparing the paper fibers to accept the colorful makeover. This self pity party will end before it started. It will morph into the revolution. I have to stop this disconnection between science and art making, between discoveries in color field and teaching art at schools.

Now it’s Perestroika, everything changes, even the name of the city and a country where I grew up. Now we live in Saint-Petersburg, Russia. We can have freedom of speech. We are questioning everything, and I’m, being an artist, questioning the fact that mixing primary colors doesn’t yield promised secondary colors, no matter what media I’ve used.

Chrysanthemums in the Red Vase, acrylic paint on canvas (in progress) by Masha Hemmerling

Chrysanthemums in the Red Vase, acrylic paint on canvas (in progress) by Masha Hemmerling

Masha Hemmerling in the studio painting, Chrysanthemums in the Red Vase, acrylic paint on canvas

Chrysanthemums in the Red Vase, acrylic paint on canvas by Masha Hemmerling

A Color Tree for Learning

“Why do they make us memorize a theory that does not work?”, I am asking myself during the Science of Materials test. What would I do different if I were them? What if teachers themselves don’t know the answer yet?

Even though practice did not support theory, it was engraved into my mind: red+blue=purple, blue+yellow=green, red+yellow=orange. That’s what the book said. That must be true… I must be doing something wrong.

Wait, what was that?… The pencil scribbles on the paper an image of a tree… Now, 30 years later, I know the truth. But back then… the color theory, the color spectrum, the mixing formula… a little girl…

The color in pigments and light are so mysterious and so invigorating, it mesmerizes my young mind. It disappears with the light, and it comes back to life with the sunrise, or when we turned the switch on… How magnificent that our eyes can see this miracle of color. Light, pigment, eyes and mind – there must be a connection. It’s arts and science, it’s theory and practice working together like one body. The Maker of it all is brilliant!

That little girl is eager to reach for more leaves. They are very precious to her – she does not want them to touch the ground and fade. She is seeking knowledge, but she is so small! She has to wait till the tree will start shading its leaves.

But wait, there is someone else in there… in the shadow of a tree, out of the spotlight. Let me see, I need to concentrate… please give me a minute!

The Color Tree by Masha Hemmerling

How did it happened so fast? In a blink of an eye I became a teaching artist! Nothing should keep me now from braking off of useless theory. I see unhappy faces of my students, the expectations were high, but the magic trick went wrong. The color wheel feels wrong, the process of making secondary colors is not working. I have to go on the quest for my student’s sake.

The light at the end of the tunnel is getting bigger. I finished the gentleman, who is sitting under the tree in a shadow. He is holding on to something precious so tightly – its the work of his life. It’s the hope of his life and a gift to the future generations.

I am looking up his features on the website that was named after him. Reading about him inspired this art piece. I feel I owe him for all that hard work, discoveries, research and desire to bridge the science and art, bright minds and young brains.

… Now I have the privilege of not only teaching art, but writing my own art curriculum for children in private christian schools. I’m working hard, inventing something new by connecting faith and building blocks of art.

I teach my art students using my curriculum, I see many fulfilled lives, happy creative souls. I see the eagerness to learn and I have a lot to give them. I want to pass the knowledge. I have all tools now to do that. Almost all of them.

Watercolor and acrylic paint, heart shaped cacti on paper.

A pencil’s sketch of a handsome gentleman with a grey hair and glasses appears on the right side of the tree. The tree itself is his invention. The value is in the tree’s trunk, the hue is in its crown, the chroma is in its branches, it is his tree. It’s tall and strong. The feelings of that gentleman who is a painter, art teacher and inventor himself resonates with me so much!

… One self publishing company showed interest in my curriculum and I am revising it now, after two years of teaching it – it definitely needs to be polished again. Some touch ups on few lessons about elements of art here and there are needed. But the rubric on color needs a total transformation, a full revamp. It is the time to tell the truth, it is the time to unearth the mechanism that is working better than an old color theory. I roll my sleeves and get to work. I search the books, the internet, and articles on color…

It’s time to paint the tree, a girl and a gentleman himself. It’s time to give it a life of its own. His color tree is my inspiration, I’m looking at his pixelized tree, and carefully trying to match the colors. I’m using watercolors for the crown.

My hand is scanning an already created image in my head and working on bringing it to life. I hold my breath as thirsty fibers swallow up the watercolor left by the brush. My heart is full, I’m in the process. I have one day left until the deadline.

When I did a makeover on elements of art for my teacher’s manual, I had no problem of assigning dimensions to them, but then I hit the roadblock. So, if Dot – 0D, line – 1D, shape – 2D, form, texture – 3D, space – 4D, then what about color and value?

Traditional Russian Folk Art Khokhloma, acrylic paint on wood by Masha Hemmerling

I have no idea about what dimension to give to these two elements. I can’t finish my manuscripts without it, I’m finding myself back to my research. I need more information!

… Now I will be working on the branches. I will be painting them with chroma, because I need to bring them from the tree crown all the way down to the tree trunk. They will bridge the metamorphosis of colors from the leaves all the way down to the white-grey-black value of the tree trunk.

I am mixing different hues of watercolor with white and gray pigments of acrylic paint. I’m thinking that blending two different media will yield the desired result – the blending of ideas and additional dimensions.

The date of the manuscript submission is coming closer. And I waited long enough, then out of nowhere… boom! The needed guidance, the answer, came from one of my favorite company’s podcast.

The Art of Ed was announcing that they will be having Maggie Maggio talking about A Better Approach to Color Theory! I’ll wait till then. I will finally learn everything I need to know about color, and I’ll pass on the knowledge to my students. Time, please hurry up!

Bouquet of Roses, watercolor on canvas by Masha Hemmerling

That little girl under the tree will be painted with acrylic paint. The color of her clothes is matching the colors of the tree crown on her side. Oh, boy, how eager she is to reach for knowledge! She will catch that fallen leaf… she will take care of it.

… Oh, wow, two full podcasts on Color! I can’t believe that its here, and my every question is being answered! So, color does have dimensions! All three of them! The CMY is the answer to the successful mixing of the secondary colors! And why don’t we teach our students about color in pigment and color in light, they do use printers and devises with screens, right?

I am now painting the gentleman’s clothes. I am matching colors to the hues above him. His eyes are looking into the future. I’m painting his globe – the 3D model of his research. How genius is that? How simple and how true! It resonates with every fiber of my soul.

There is so much to learn, but there is so little time. I drink information from the Munsell’s website source and from the Kolormondo. I’m glad I waited. I’m happy I was patient. All information that I learned about is simple and stunning. I quickly add important points and references to my manuscript for teachers. The color and a value as elements of art got a head-to-toe makeover and they look stunning!

I’ll put finishing touches onto the strong roots of the Color tree. I’ll surround them with grass. Then, when I’ll be done with this painting, they’ll spread dip and wide on their own. It’s time to submit my painting. It’s time to write the statement.

The girl is jumping under the tree, and the gentleman is smiling as he is hugging his globe. “Mr. Munsell, I know how you feel” – I’m telling the gentleman… “I know how you feel too” – I’m telling the little girl…

A special sound alerted me of a new email arriving to my box. I open it up, and read few times over because the news is overwhelming… It left me speechless, and my family is confused for why am I jumping?

In my imagination I am patting girl on her back and shaking Mr. Munsell’s hand. I want to tell him so much, but he grabs his globe and goes back under the tree. I know what he is saying. It’s now my turn to go and teach the facts about color. He passed this color tree as a baton to all of as – the visual arts educators. The time to act on it is now.

As I am sitting at my desk with my finished manuscript opened on the screen of my laptop, I press the button “send”. The journey just began.

I can’t wait till September, when I would be able to share with my students all about Albert Munsell, companies who are using his color system (which might surprise them!), and the best discovery of all – three dimensions of color: hue, value and chroma. I’ll teach them about CMY as modern primary colors, and the new Color Mixing formulas. I can’t wait till my manuscript will turn into a manual for Christian art teachers, where they will learn more about Albert Munsell’s color system that can be used in schools. I also can’t wait to see the smiles on my student’s faces as they would be mixing true secondary colors using Cyan and Magenta, Cyan and Yellow, Magenta and Yellow…

Hello, Purple, Green and Orange, I’ve been looking of you my whole life! I’m so glad I found you! … and by the way, you look bright and clear!

About the Author

Masha (Maria) Hemmerling is an artist of 35 years, art teacher of 7 years and art curriculum developer of 5 years. She majored from Russian Collage of Traditional Culture with her diploma in Fine Arts, and minor in Traditional Russian Folk art.

While still in Russia Masha worked as an Art teacher at the Technical and Vocational School for Disabled, taught kids about Bible through arts and crafts at the Sunday school, was an art tutor, freelance artist, worked as an artist for different companies and non-profit organizations. Many of her artwork is in private collections all around the world: Scandinavia, Europe, Russia, and America.

After moving to United States Masha (Maria) Hemmerling accomplished the following:

Local art exhibits:

• Personal art exhibit at La Vien an Rose – 2004.
• Orange District Fine Arts Festival awards winner for 2006, 2007 and 2008.

Artist calls:

• Winner of Orange District Fine Arts Festival call for book cover design for 2006, 2007.
• Masha’s original art work was selected for display during the Munsell Centennial Color Symposium of 2018, and was printed in the special Munsell Centennial edition of the journal Color Research and Application.

Art Teacher Experience:

• Volunteered at her children’s school as an art teacher of Meet the Masters program for 2012-2017.
• She taught in one private Christian elementary school all three of her author’s programs (including Elements of Art) from 2015-2017. About 100 of Masha’s elementary students have participated in ACSI Art Festivals and won multiple awards 2015-2017.
• Masha started her Inspirational Online Art Studio “PaperPaint&Palette” in the summer of 2017. She is using her website and different social media as a platform for her art tutorials, digital courses and live broadcasts that are based on the Cristian principals.
• Recently she started a project, “The Mission of a Painted Block”, where she is organizing local churches, school-age students, homeschooling parents and members of philanthropic organizations to donate wooden building blocks. Then she brings volunteers to paint them with uplifting design and inspirational words from the Bible. Those wooden blocks are being donated to the Containers of Hope, and sent to different countries around the world, where they are being gifted to the local people.
• Currently Masha is working as an K-8th grade art teacher in another private Christian School in Southern California. She also developing an art curriculum for the local K-12th grade Christian homeschooling organization.

To connect to Masha, and to see her video tutorials and art projects, please go to:

• Email: mashahemm@paperpaintandpalette.com
• Website: www.paperpaintandpalette.com
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/paperpaintandpalette/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mashahemmerling/
• YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCWj_diBRutXbI9Lh96MTcjw

We got a chance to speak with Jennifer Cohlman Bracchi, Reference Librarian at Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum in New York City, to talk about a new color exhibit, Saturated: The Allure and Science of Color.

The show, “explores the elusive, complex phenomenon of color perception and how it has captivated artists, designers, scientists and philosophers.” Featuring over 190 color objects, this exhibit, proves how vast and fascinating the world of color is.

Featured Image (left): J.B. Schmetterling (Butterfly) Hanging Lamp, 2011; Designed by Ingo Maurer and Axel Schmid; Germany; mouth-blown glass, 3d-printed (flexible free-formed) plastic, machined brass, halogen light source; H x diam.: 46 x 32 cm (18 1/8 x 12 9/16 in.); Gift of Ingo Maurer GmbH and Graham Owen; 2014-7-1-a/c; Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum. Photo: Matt Flynn © Smithsonian Institution. COPYRIGHT:Image may not be reproduced without authorization of the Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum, Smithsonian Institution

Last time we talked, it was about the Color in a New Light exhibit. Does this installation pick up where it left off, or is it different?

A little bit of both. It’s greatly expanded, that is probably the biggest difference. In the museum space, we are taking up much of the second floor, which is dedicated “collections” space usually. It does include a number of books, roughly 45 total, which is the largest number of library books we have ever put on display in one single exhibition for the museum.

The idea for the show came about because my co-curator, Susan Brown, Curator of Textiles at Cooper Hewitt, saw Color in a New Light in D.C. We were talking about it over lunch one day, and I was very enthusiastically telling her how much more I had learned that we weren’t able to show in that first exhibit (because there wasn’t enough room in the two modest cases that were on display in the Natural History Museum). We talked more, she started pitching the idea to the museum, and they green lighted it. When we started planning it out, we realized there were enough books to fill the first gallery on the second floor, with additional books sprinkled throughout the other larger gallery, which is primarily devoted to the museums collection.

Tell us about the themes or sections in this show

Some of the themes in this show are similar to the four themes in the original show. The way we have broken it down at the museum is the first gallery, which features mainly books, is called Capturing Color. We include some of the books on display in the first show like Newton’s Opticks: or, A Treatise of the Reflexions, Refractions, Inflexions and Colours of Light, Goethe’s Theory of Colours, and LeBlon’s Coloritto.

Once we knew the show was going to happen, we were able to include newly acquired books, including Chevreul’s hemisphere of color model book, Des Couleurs, featuring 72 different hues, which uses a beautiful mezzotint color printing technique. This piece is a great jumping off point for discussing what goes into the making of a three-dimensional model. In addition to hue, which is what we think of as color, we talk about saturation, or the purity of a color, and we also talk about brightness, which is the edition of white or black.

Another recent acquisition in the Capturing Color section is Johannes Itten’s 1921, Color Star, which is a twelve pointed star he developed as a tool, when he was teaching at the Bauhaus. There are also some big names of the color world like Ostwald and Moses Harris.

Photo: Matt Flynn © Smithsonian Institution
COPYRIGHT: Cooper Hewitt

How did you decide on the seven sections that were chosen?

Since we were bringing Cooper Hewitt’s amazing design collection into this show, where you have a quarter of a million objects to choose from, we knew there were some objects that had to be included, because they were just so connected or so relevant to the topic. But we also used some of the previous categories from the first exhibit to guide our choices as well.

When you enter the other part of the show, you encounter a section on Color Optics, where we talk about structured color… things like iridescents, or dichroic film. What’s so great about combining this with the museum’s collection is that things that can be hard to address in books, you can really understand better by looking at a physical object. So we have a beautiful fan made out of peacock feathers, there is an embroidered textile using beetle wings, for fluorescents, there is a poster using dayglo or fluorescent ink, which just glows before your eyes, along with a table runner that looks electrified, but really it’s just using light energy to express what comes from the ultraviolet gamut of the spectrum. We talk about simultaneous contrast, having Chevreul in there again, paired with wallpaper showing complementary reds and greens, which seems to vibrate before your eyes. Also, included are some great psychedelic posters from the 60’s. There is a plate from Josef Albers, along with posters created by students of Albers.

The section on Creating Color is similar to what was called Making Color in the previous exhibition. We have a Mexican garment called a wheapeil, featuring the purple dye that is created by poking sea snails to get them to secrete their ink, paired with a scarf using synthetic dyes. In addition to these two examples, which talk nicely about natural dyes versus synthetic dyes, we have many examples of natural dyes that are made up of all sorts of materials – resins to create lacquers, digital prints using natural dyes, along with a book with over 2,500 natural dye samples. Then we have technology driven examples using synthetic dyes or inventions like anodized aluminum, a brilliantly colored flatware set created by setting the metal in an electrical bath, where the dye, along with the electrical charge, creates the color effect. We have a plastic chair showing what it looks like when nylon gets injected with dye when it is in liquid form, and a 3D printed vase. In other words, a wide variety of different approaches to coloring various materials.

Signature Collection: Picnic Flatware Place Setting (New York, New York, USA), 1986; Designed by David Tisdale (American, b. 1956); Anodized aluminum; Knife: 20.5 x 2.4 x 0.5 cm (8 1/16 x 15/16 x 3/16 in.); Museum purchase from Eleanor G. Hewitt Fund, 1986-94-1/3,10
Photo: © Smithsonian Institution  COPYRIGHT: Cooper Hewitt

The next section is on Navigating Color which features color as a useful tool for visual organization, such as infographics. In the library we have an 1870 U.S. Census, which has a beautifully colored section showing the religious affiliations of populations by State. A book that teaches Euclid’s geometry from the mid-1800’s, where they used color as the main teaching tool, rather than abc’s, and they look like little Mondrian paintings.

My favorite in the section is the 1974, Massimo Vignelli, New York subway map, where he applies color to the subway lines for the first time, which seems like a no-brainer, but it was a hugely helpful tool for helping navigate our subway world.

Moving on from that section, you step into Color Collaboration, which displays the tools designers use to communicate color. It includes a book by Édouard Guichard, Die Harmonie der Farben [The Harmony of Colors], which suggests tasteful color combinations paired with porcelain sample plates, which manufacturers would use to express all the different colors they could achieve with the porcelain. We have what is called a color blanket. It’s expensive to set a loom to do a weave, so they set six different vertical colors and then cross those horizontally with different colored threads, creating a patchwork of all the variations using those different color combinations, allowing the designer or manufacturer to choose which one they want to put into production.

A more recent addition for this section is the Pantone Skintone Guide. We figure our audience is familiar with the Pantone standard deck, so we wanted to feature something they weren’t as familiar with. This was developed in the last few years using a spectrophotometer that captures skin tones that exist in the world, and translates them into a fan deck form. This of course, gets a lot of use in the cosmetics industry.

In Consumer Choice, we touched on this a bit in the first show with the Fiesta pitcher and trade catalogues showing samples of objects featured in various colors. In this exhibit we get to show many objects, from Henry Dreyfuss’ 1956 princess pink telephone, marketed at that time towards teenage girls, to Apple’s iMac computer from the late 90’s in the candy color palette. I don’t know how old you are, but I remember when those came out, and they certainly broke the mold in terms of the colors we typically associated with a desktop – normally beige, grey, or black – Apple took a unique approach to making the personal computer “more personal”. We have a Dyson vacuum cleaner in a bold yellow and grey, which is not your typical vacuum color. The section emphasizes how color can be used to sell products.

In Color and Form, we have mostly two-dimensional works which look three-dimensional, emphasizing how color is key in understanding how we see our three-dimensional world through subtle variations in shading, shadow and light. This includes very bold graphic posters which use color to make them appear three-dimensional.

What will we see from Munsell this time around?

Munsell is featured in the Capturing Color section. There are three main cases filled with books. The third case is devoted to color measurement. In that case we feature Milton Bradley, Robert Ridgeway, who was the Smithsonian’s first Ornithologist, along with the Munsell, Atlas of the Munsell Color System. We talk about spectrophotometers in that case as well, and how that is another tool used to measure color.

Although we featured the Atlas in the last exhibit, this time we are showcasing a horizontal cross-section of the color tree, rather than a vertical one. This helps us emphasize about Munsell, how his approach was different than any of the other colorists featured – that is, his non-geometric form view of color space. Because he was using spinning disks for the model, it allowed for a much more organic shape that wasn’t constricted into being a perfect sphere or a double cone. We also mention how Munsell’s system really bridged into the CIE lab and paved the way for the development of color standards. It can be difficult for a typical visitor to understand all these concepts. It is hard to make the leap from the world of what our eyes perceive, into the world of what scientific instruments can detect, but the Munsell system was key in helping to make this transition.

Photo: Matt Flynn © Smithsonian Institution
COPYRIGHT: Cooper Hewitt

Is the intention for visitors to walk through this exhibit in any particular order?

Not really. When you go up the staircase, you hit Capturing Color first, it is in this long hall that is darker and wood paneled. That is where most of the books are, along with flat works against the wall. But for the other sections I described, there are actually three entry points to the gallery that houses them. So it is not linear by any means, you can jump in at any point. It is nice to hit Capturing Color first because it teaches you some of the fundamental principles of how color works and if you know this going into the next sections, it can only help you better understand what you are looking at. But it doesn’t have to happen in a specific sequence. Within the sections, it is not in any order either. Objects are grouped together in large aquarium type tanks that follow a natural tendency to read left to right, but again, they don’t have to be in any special order.

What is your favorite section and why?

I am partial to books, so Capturing Color is what my heart is close to, but being able to co-create with someone who knows the museum’s collection has been a tremendous learning experience for me. That is because the approach is different when curating objects then when you are just working with books. I don’t think I could pick just one, but there are two objects that I love. They both feature light, which is always a challenge for museum display. What is so special about these two pieces is they are displaying dichroic film or multichroic techniques where there is no pigment involved, it is all the refraction of light. One is a table called Shimmer Table, by Patricia Urquiola. It literally reflects a brilliant pink, transfers a bright green color, and as you walk around it, it has all the colors of the rainbow in it. It’s closely connected to the neon pieces in the Color Optics section, even though it’s not paired with those. It’s just a stunning piece to experience. Similar to that is a lamp by Formafantasma that also features dichroic film. It is placed against a wall where it’s reflecting this glowing spectrum along a scrim. When you walk around the other side of the gallery, you get to see what is creating this immense spectrum, and you see it is this minimal lamp. So those are my favorites.

What has been interesting for you to learn about color from this exhibit? Do you feel like you walk through the world differently?

It is such a topic of endless fascination, and even though I did a ton of additional reading and research, I feel like I have barely skimmed the surface of the many aspects of color. I don’t know where I will go next with it, not sure if there will be another exhibition necessarily, but I hope I can continue learning about it.

One of the things we have in the exhibition is the Phillips Hue light bulb, in the great hall chandelier, rotating between different shades of white. The bulbs can go from morning light, to midday light, to evening light, to incandescent, to fluorescent light. I do notice the changing of the lights outside and how it affects what I am looking at a lot more intensely than before. Even in looking at artist works, or scanning through Instagrams designer feeds, I can pick up on the artists and designers that are really into color just by how they are using it. I still wear a lot black and grey, so it hasn’t made me any bolder in my color choices “[laughter]”. I think I am much more attentive to the color around me and I appreciate what a true craft it is when someone achieves beautiful color – it is not as simple as picking a few colors from a Pantone color deck that are going to look good together, there is a lot of craftsmanship and a lot of knowledge and experience that goes into successful results in a work or designed object in terms of its color.

Traité théorique et pratique de l’impression des tissus / / par J. Persoz; Persoz, J. (Jean), 1805-1868; 4 v. : diagrs., patterns ; 22 cm. + 1 atlas (20 leaves of plates : ill. (partly double, partly col.) ; 32 cm.); Smithsonian Libraries
Photo: Matt Flynn © Smithsonian Institution
COPYRIGHT:Image may not be reproduced without permission from Smithsonian Libraries.

What are visitors reactions to the show?

We typically give several tours a day, so it’s always interesting to hear what people have to say during those. When I was first learning about additive and subtractive color mixing, I was blown away that red light and green light makes yellow. I guess I didn’t realize how unknown the primary colors are to most people. We all learn our primary colors in grade school and we mix paints, but the primary colors of light are completely different. Most people just aren’t aware of that and it’s one of the fundamental things you need to know when you start talking about color theory. So it’s interesting to see people’s reactions to that. It’s kind of a challenge to talk about it in a way that everyone can understand, so that has been fun.

People really respond to the sub-themes we have in Capturing Color.  Camouflage and color blindness in particular, which includes the Ishihara color blindness test – it is interactive so people can figure out what they can or cannot see. There is a 3D wallpaper where you put on the old fashioned glasses where one lens is red and one is blue, filtering out the red and blue-green printed on the wallpaper and creating the 3D effect. This creates two different images for your eyes but you mind merges those images and creates the three-dimensional effect. The optics and phenomena have been the most fun as far as the visitors reactions, because we were able to make these fun to experience. That has been a highlight for me.

Photo: Matt Flynn © Smithsonian Institution
COPYRIGHT:Cooper Hewitt

Anything else you would like to mention?

I am really excited to be going to the Munsell Centennial Symposium to give a poster presentation on Wednesday afternoon. Looking forward to hearing these speakers whose books I have been pouring over. So many of the authors that will be at this event totally informed my knowledge that helped in putting together this show. There is going to be so much conversation around color education which I find fascinating. I am going to give a poster on an exhibition Cooper Union Museum did which resulted in the library of Dorothy Nickerson, along with some other members of the ISCC being donated to the museum’s library, now Smithsonian Libraries.

Saturated: The Allure and Science of Color will be on view May 11th, 2018 through January 13th, 2019. If you get a chance to see the show, we would love to hear about your experience. Drop us a line in the comments below.

I recently read a book about shades of grey. No, not that book. I’m talking about Shades of Grey, a novel by Jasper Fforde, and you wouldn’t have to be ashamed to read this book in public.

Those of us who deal in color for work or enjoyment will be entertained by color references at every turn. For instance, whereas we remember Albert H. Munsell as the man who created a system for describing color, the people in the fictional dystopian land of Chromatica remember him as the writer of the Rules, the system by which their society is run. Munsell was a very logical choice of authorities on Fforde’s part because, you see, theirs is a society based on color.

The Word of Munsell

In Chromatica, everyone is only capable of seeing one natural hue, and the hue you see determines your place in the collective. In other words, the place of your color on the spectrum translates to your rank in society. Reds, for instance, are three ranks below Greens. Furthermore, those who can see more of the color receive a higher status. The only people lower in society than Reds are the Greys, who can see no color at all, and are therefore relegated to a servant class. Everyone can see synthetic color, however, which has to be pumped in from National Color. Towns have color gardens where citizens can go to see synthetic color. Poorer towns have color gardens based on the “outdated Red-Blue-Yellow Color Model,” but wealthier towns use the more up-to-date system of combining cyan, yellow, and magenta to produce a wider range of colors.

In Fforde’s world, color does more than just make life more interesting. It also has the power to heal. Doctors, or swatchmen as they are called, show swatches of synthetic color to their patients. Depending on the color they choose, viewing these swatches can cure everything from male pattern baldness to an overproduction of earwax. You have to be careful of viewing too much green, however, because certain shades could cause intoxication or even death.

Marriage to a complementary color is, of course, strictly forbidden by the Rules. Rather, citizens must seek a mate with whom they can produce offspring to continue their color, or to move the family up the Chromatic hierarchy. People’s last names refer to their color. Fforde had some fun with this, including names such as Floyd Pinken and a Grey named Dorian.

This novel is a must-read for color enthusiasts, who will delight in catching all the color references that might be lost to others. I also enjoyed looking up characters’ last names when they were colors I did not know, such as Gamboge and Fandago. We will enjoy more than the average person, perhaps, laughing at a world where “Our Munsell” is something of a god. I have a Munsell color chart on my office door, and it makes me smile a little more after having read Fforde’s book.

I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity to ask Jasper Fforde some color-related questions. Here’s what I asked.

You’ve mentioned before that you are fascinated by color, and how it doesn’t actually exist. Where did you first learn about color? From something you read?

I think so, or something I heard – that colour in itself is not a tangible commodity – out there in the real world, not the one observed by us, there is no colour – simply motion of material. Colour to us is an interpretation of the world, useful for us to make sense of how we perceive it. A sunset is not beautiful, a rainbow is not beautiful, a lorikeet is not beautiful – it is our perception of them that gives them beauty. The sensation known to us as ‘red’ is merely that – a sensation, an abstract concept. And I liked the idea of raising an abstract concept to the guiding factor in a society – to cover healthcare, social order, and the economy.

Where did you first hear of Albert Munsell? What made you decide he was the writer of the Rules? Were there any other potential candidates for the job?

Researching the idea I came across Albert Munsell, and while not the only person to investigate colour, I think he was the first person to formulate it into the triumvirate of Chroma, Hue and brightness that gives us colour as we know it. He’s got a good name, too. But I could have used another, I guess. I just chanced upon him and thought: This will do.

Were you already familiar with colors like gamboge, yewberry, and fandango before writing the book? If not, where did your color names come from?

Again, research, and it’s a fascinating subject, giving names to abstract concepts. How could one differentiate between Cardinal and Crimson without having seen them? Or even Flame, Signal, or Burgundy? It was just another aspect of the oddness of colour, although to be honest, what I wanted to do was to give the society a hundred words for yellow – which would be impossible, as no-one reading the book would have the least idea what I would be talking. It was one of the few limits I imposed upon myself.

How did you decide which colors would cause or heal which conditions?

Kind of randomly, although the notion of ‘The Green Room’ has its base in the room in Pinewood studios where actors were taken in between set-ups, the calming shade meant to rest their eyes. The idea of being shuffled off this mortal coil be a particular shade of green I rather liked – taking the abstract concept to a point at which it can be a mechanism for euthanasia – there was a murderous subplot here somewhere, but I never used it.

Fforde hopes to begin work on the sequels in 2019, so be on the lookout for the rest of the series!

To check out more of Jasper’s work, go to http://www.jasperfforde.com. 

About the Author

Krista Williams is Assistant Professor of French in the Department of Foreign Languages and Cultures at the University of Evansville. In the fall, she will begin as Visiting Assistant Professor of French in the Department of French, Francophone and Italian Studies at the College of Charleston. Her research concerns how colors are defined and translated in dictionaries. She may be reached at krimwill@indiana.edu. Kristina Hochwender, an Assistant Professor in the Department of English at the University of Evansville, contributed interview questions, in addition to introducing Dr. Williams to the book.

Planets in Star Wars films often challenge scientific standards of real life environments and their resulting soil surfaces. However, these intriguing lands, even if geologically odd, are truly fun to imagine and of course, to notate.

The Soil Colors of Crait

Desolate and remote, this Star Wars planet is primarily covered in sodium rich salt. There are some mountains and canyons, but the white of the salt flats dominates the color landscape. The lightweight and slick nature of the salt means wind storms and slippery surfaces could make for difficult conditions when traversing the land.

Underneath the white salt surface of Crait, is a rich red soil, noticeable when a human walks across the salt flats, revealing red footprints, or when spacecrafts trail plumes of red dust as they fly close to the terrain. What makes this color shift from stark white to blood red? As Volcanologist, Robin Andrews suggests, it could be “potassium chloride in mineral form” or “fossilized remnants of red algae”. Ken Herkenhoff, an astrogeologist suggests the red may be a sign that the planet Crait was once covered in a sea of salt water. High oxygen levels on the planet could have resulted in oxidation, due to the “interaction of oxygen and iron.” All possibilities we took into consideration when coming up with a set of color notations for Crait.

Crait Soil Colors

The salt flats where the film was shot are located in Salar de Unyuni. The largest salt flat in the world, its unique gypsum surface ranges from a pale yellow-green white to a grey or brownish white. Although you won’t find the red dust under this real life salt pan, we took liberties here to imagine the colors ranging from marsala to blood red. Perhaps deeper layers would reveal lithium rich volcanic soils... but we will leave those to the imagination.

5BG 9/2

10GY 8/2

2.5GY 7/4

10YR 8/3

5R 4/6

10R 3/12

Photos Courtesy of Wookiepedia

Are you a Star Wars fan and a soil scientist? Have you run an analysis of a planet and want to see it notated. Then give us a shout out – we would love to get your help. Who knows, maybe someday we will have an Interplanetary Soil Book of Color.

]]> https://munsell.com/color-blog/star-wars-planetary-soil-colors-imagined/feed/ 0 https://munsell.com/color-blog/new-anatomy-of-colour-david-briggs-webinar/ https://munsell.com/color-blog/new-anatomy-of-colour-david-briggs-webinar/#comments Tue, 13 Mar 2018 18:55:45 +0000 http://munsell.com/?p=8799 International Colour Day is March 21st, and to celebrate, Inter-Society Color Council (ISCC) is hosting a webinar with painter and teacher David Briggs, who will be presenting at the Munsell Centennial Color Symposium in June. What sets David apart from other … Continue reading →]]>

International Colour Day is March 21st, and to celebrate, Inter-Society Color Council (ISCC) is hosting a webinar with painter and teacher David Briggs, who will be presenting at the Munsell Centennial Color Symposium in June.

What sets David apart from other experts in the field of colour, is his ability to make the science of colour accessible and useful to artists. We had a chance to chat about his work in the field and the upcoming webinar.

How did you learn about colour?

In terms of theoretical knowledge most of it has come through preparing for and presenting courses. I’ve been lucky to have the opportunity to teach a very long-running five-day colour theory workshop at the Julian Ashton Art School and also an undergraduate lecture course on the history of colour theory and practice at our National Art School. In addition I’ve taught many practical painting classes at both schools that forced me to really understand and communicate what I’m doing with colour when I’m painting.

When did you start your website, which combines the art and science of colour?

I started The Dimensions of Colour when I was teaching drawing at a graphic design school. A brilliant multimedia lecturer named Dave Agius directed his class to create websites for other staff members as class projects, so I threw together the little I knew at the time, and “The Dimensions of Colour” was launched in November 2007.

What inspired you to create your website?

A great deal of colour education for artists was and is in the form of “traditional” (red-yellow-blue) colour theory, which encapsulates the understanding we had of colour in the first half of the nineteenth century. At the other extreme, there was Bruce MacEvoy’s encyclopaedic treatment of colour science, which is an astonishing achievement, but which I felt did not emphasize enough the most useful aspects of colour science. Notably, the Munsell framework, some relationships pointed out by Arthur Pope in the 1920s (especially the importance of lines of uniform saturation as shading series), the very different mixing behaviours of paints near the additive and subtractive primary hues respectively, and the different colour spaces used in digital painting. So these were the main things I focused on when I first launched the site.

Your ISCC webinar for International Colour Day –  “The New Anatomy of Color” –  is about expanding from Munsell’s Hue, Value and Chroma to include 7 attributes of color. Of all the topics about color, why did you decide to focus this webinar on these seven attributes?

I’d like to clarify I’ll be mostly talking about the six standard attributes of perceived colour of CIE terminology, which have been stable for several decades, but which are still new, in my teaching experience, to almost everyone except colour scientists. My only addition is the attribute of brilliance/blackness, which has long been used outside the CIE system.

After trying virtually every sequence of topics possible I’m now convinced that the best starting point for a colour course is a close look at these attributes of perceived colour, beginning of course with hue, lightness and chroma, followed by the four attributes of brightness, colourfulness, saturation and brilliance. Unfortunately colour scientists have not had much success in communicating this terminology without misunderstandings to other specializations like neuroscience and philosophy, let alone to painters, and I hope I can contribute something is this regard.

Do you have illustrations that graphically compare each colour attribute?

I have LOTS of diagrams. Here’s just one to show the simple yet astonishing distinction between lightness and chroma on the one hand, and brightness and colourfulness on the other. Without having to think about it, we see this stripe of paint as having the same object colour, that is the same hue, lightness and chroma, over its length. We would not be surprised to discover that the stripe matches the same Munsell chip placed beside it in the shadow and in the light. Nevertheless, the area of the stripe in the light appears brighter and more colourful than the area in the shadow. Brightness and colourfulness are attributes of the appearance of the light coming from different areas of the stripe. So really, you simultaneously have two colour perceptions, the hue, lightness and chroma seen as belonging to the stripe itself, and the hue, brightness, and colourfulness of the light reaching your eye from different areas of the stripe. We only perceive objects as having lightness and chroma, instead of merely constantly changing brightness and colourfulness, because of the remarkable ability of our visual system to instantly, unconsciously and seemingly effortlessly, parse the visual field into object colours and illumination.

Colour is already complex enough with just Munsell’s three attributes of Hue, Value (lightness) and Chroma. As an artist, why should I learn about four more attributes? Why should I care?

We don’t get to choose the number of attributes we have to deal with, so the alternative to having more attribute names is to use the same name for different attributes – which really does make things complex. There’s a very widely used and useful digital colour space known variously as HSB (“B” for “brightness”) or HSV (“V” for “value”). “S” is a simple predictor of relative saturation in the strict sense (i.e. NOT chroma, which is commonly called saturation) and “B” or “V” is neither brightness nor lightness, but a predictor of relative brilliance (“relative” in each case meaning relative to the maximum possible for an RGB colour of that hue angle H). Artists who lack the concepts of saturation and brilliance commonly resort to explanations in terms of what they call, “colour temperature” to describe the colours of illuminated objects. For example, highlights are “cool” (because “white is a cool”), full-lights are “warm” but half-lights are “cool” (because “grey is a cool”) and so on. This is not only clumsy and inadequate, but also exasperating for students who find their teachers are all using these terms differently.

What is the importance of each of these attributes for you personally as a painter and for student painters?

Of the three most familiar attributes of colour, hue attracts the most attention from beginner painters, very often to the detriment of the other two. Representationally and compositionally, lightness is the most important attribute of colour, and the first one that every beginning painter must master. While of less pressing importance than lightness, careful attention to chroma provides the refinement lacking in many beginners’ paintings. One advantage experienced by painters using the Munsell “big book” is they become used to making precise decisions in relation to the Munsell chroma scales.

Painters translate the brightness and colourfulness of a real or imagined scene into the lightness and chroma of their paints. Indeed, painters can have difficulty grasping the concepts of brightness and colourfulness because they automatically think of the visual field in terms of the lightness and chroma of the paints they would use. Painters soon discover their casual impressions of relative brightness can be very different from the results of careful comparison, for example by comparing with a Munsell chip or greyscale step held at a fixed angle, or by ‘squinting”.

Saturation and brilliance are, for a start, very useful concepts for anyone painting objects under varying levels of illumination. A single object colour will be depicted using a series of image colours with the same saturation, and objects of different colours will be depicted by image colours that maintain the same relative brilliance as the objects pass from shadow to light. Getting these relationships right creates a convincing effect of objects in light, as these digital realizations of some of Arthur Pope’s diagrams from 1922 show, which brings us back to one of my main interests in creating my site ten years ago.

To learn more from David, register for The New Anatomy of Colour Webinar.

Visit the Munsell Centennial Color Symposium site to learn more about the upcoming event.

About the Author

David Briggs is a painter and teacher at the Julian Ashton Art School and the National Art School in Sydney, Australia. He has been teaching classes on colour for painters for nearly twenty years, including a long-running intensive five-day workshop, Colour, Light and Vision, and an undergraduate lecture course on the history of artistic colour theory and practice, Theories of Colour. David is the Chairperson of the New South Wales Division of the Colour Society of Australia and has contributed to publications including a chapter on colour spaces in the forthcoming Routledge Handbook of Philosophy of Colour. Some of his efforts to present current scientific understanding of colour in ways that are accessible and useful to painters can be seen on his website, The Dimensions of Colour. 

 

 

]]> https://munsell.com/color-blog/new-anatomy-of-colour-david-briggs-webinar/feed/ 1 https://munsell.com/color-blog/an-interview-with-color-doctor-joan-levy-hepburn/ https://munsell.com/color-blog/an-interview-with-color-doctor-joan-levy-hepburn/#respond Mon, 05 Mar 2018 19:59:29 +0000 http://munsell.com/?p=8785 Tell us about the color separation company you founded I’ve been a painter my whole life. Around the time I graduated from art school, no one was really helping painting students figure out what to do for a real job, … Continue reading →]]>

Tell us about the color separation company you founded

I’ve been a painter my whole life. Around the time I graduated from art school, no one was really helping painting students figure out what to do for a real job, you had to figure it out yourself.

As a kid growing up in the country, where I didn’t have easy access to viewing real art in museums, I had to rely on coffee table art books. When I would look at these books, I thought they looked terrible, and I couldn’t understand why people got so excited about the art in them. When I finally saw the artwork in museums, I thought, “Well that doesn’t look anything like the reproduction I have seen, why is that?”

By accident I ended up getting involved in the printing industry and saw how color separations were made. Coming to it from the point of view of a painter, I thought, “Well this is completely ridiculous, why are they doing it this way? Not only does it not make a good outcome, it doesn’t let the painting speak for itself.”

So when I was 26 I started a color separation company. I put together my knowledge of color and what I had learned from the study of painting, and came up with an approach that worked. I figured, if I was going to do a job, I wanted it to be as interesting as it was to paint. So I began specializing in doing publications for museums and galleries. I was doing work for the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Whitney Museum, Guggenheim, Chicago Art Institute, Getty Museum, National Gallery, and many others.

This new approach turned out to be better in many ways. This method was less expensive, and there were less steps involved. Remember this is back in the days of film and different types of proofing systems that were very costly. I started being referred to as the ‘Color Doctor’ because of my work in the field.

The Beaver Dam by Joan Levy Hepburn. Oil Paint on Yupo. 26 x 38 inches. 3/D Anaglyph to be viewed with red/cyan glasses.

Did one of your clients come up with the name ‘Color Doctor’?

The first person to coin that pseudonym was Rudi Stern, the owner of Let There Be Neon in NYC. I helped him create a book about neon, which is very difficult to photograph and capture the color. The color wants to fly out of the tube and become a glowing white halo. So I helped him keep the color in the tube to get a better reproduction of the colored lights for publication.

It’s a very small world in the printing industry. I went to do a job somewhere and someone said, “Oh I know who you are, you’re the Color Doctor.” I said, “What?” I was completely surprised anybody knew that.

How did new technologies impact your work in the color field?

When the company started, we had state of the art equipment – digital laser scanners and the Chromacom. This was a giant temperamental piece of machinery that had to be in a special temperature, humidity, and static controlled room. When Macintosh computers and Photoshop entered the market, this technology became obsolete.

I became a traveling color consultant for the printing industry. I identified color by assigning it numerical percentages of the subtractive colors CMYK. In this industry it is essential to know exact numbers for accurate reproduction of color. So I visited museums, museum warehouses, galleries, and collectors’ houses to look at art and to see how it was made. It was interesting to go to those places and see art that wasn’t in public view. It was also very inspiring to get new ideas about how to make paintings. I really enjoyed doing it because it wasn’t unrelated to my real work – painting.

Who was the most color reproductively challenging artist you dealt with?

Wayne Thiebaud. That’s because he is an amazing artist who really paints the physics of light. His paintings even confuse and trick a scanner or a camera. For example, a black is made of all colors, but they get buried under black. In order to turn it into a Thiebaud painting, the colors had to be excavated from the black. When I figured out how to do that, I could reproduce his paintings. He was very happy with them – he said he had never seen anybody do that before. He was very glad his paintings were being reproduced accurately.

How do you teach color?

Color is a physical perceptual experience and must be seen to be understood. So I start by creating light out of darkness using colored lights of red, green and blue. My method is to begin with a two-dimensional color wheel, then walk people through turning it into a three-dimensional sphere of color and a description of how to use it. I have a series of articles I wrote recently, intended to be read consecutively to help even a color novice, understand how it works. You can find these articles here: http://www.artatmurraypond.com/color.html.

You talk about unwanted colors or contaminants – can you explain what you mean by this?

Wanted colors are the two primary colors that mix to create a secondary hue. An unwanted color is the other primary, not contained in that mixture. For example yellow + blue = green, which is the secondary hue and the unwanted color being red – in the Munsell System.

A painting that is made of a palette of pure colors can have a jolting effect, but that affect only lasts for a moment. When our cone cells get saturated with color, they become blind to that color, causing an afterimage of the opposite color. Using unwanted color can help stimulate our appreciation of pure color. Contaminants are a tool for making pure colors more exciting.

How do you use Munsell color in your art?

In my art I combine the color system of the physics of light, and the Munsell System using pigments as a tool to create a new physical experience of light. The pigments in the chalk pastel called, “Ontario Snow Forms,” create a sense of light and temperature. You can feel the warmth of the sunlight reflecting off the cold snow. Where the blue shadows meet the white snow, there is a flicker of golden sunlight. Lately I have been making 3/D paintings. Red/Cyan glasses merge and neutralize the stereo vision into a 3/D illusion.

Ontario Snow Forms by Joan Levy Hepburn. 24 x 36 inches. Layered chalk pastel.

Talk about working with de Kooning. What was the best thing you learned from him?

I met de Kooning when I was 15 years old and he became my mentor. Before we met, I was trying to teach myself how to paint by studying art history linearly. He showed me how to think about painting in a non-linear timeline, which opened up all kinds of new possibilities. I do not make a division between representational and abstract painting – it is all painting. All successful representational paintings are good abstract paintings, and all non-objective paintings represent something. Art is a visual language. Naming objects interferes with seeing.

What is the most important thing about color to understand?

Human color vision is created by three color sensors in the cone cells – red, green and blue. Color management is simplified by the organization of three colors. The more you simplify the colors in the palette of the pigments in the Munsell System the more you will create a perceptual experience of real light. Rather than rendering the effects of light, you will use pigments of color to create a real physical sensation of color as light.

Anything else you would like to share with us?

On April 21st I will be teaching a full-day workshop on color, which includes lunch and all materials needed. In this workshop you will learn all you need to know about color and applying it to all applications. The workshop will cover the materials described in the series of color essays on my website www.artatmurraypond.com and more hands-on interaction. It is a fun way to experience color theory painlessly and in a way that you will remember!

 

 

]]> https://munsell.com/color-blog/an-interview-with-color-doctor-joan-levy-hepburn/feed/ 0 https://munsell.com/color-blog/visual-analytics-color-wheel-triad-harmony/ https://munsell.com/color-blog/visual-analytics-color-wheel-triad-harmony/#respond Mon, 26 Feb 2018 15:36:46 +0000 http://munsell.com/?p=8778 Typically, a triad color harmony uses three colors that are equally spaced around a color wheel where the total numbers of hues can be divided into three. For Munsell Color Harmony, this is not possible since there are a total number … Continue reading →]]>

Typically, a triad color harmony uses three colors that are equally spaced around a color wheel where the total numbers of hues can be divided into three. For Munsell Color Harmony, this is not possible since there are a total number of ten hues spaced around the wheel.

As we discussed in our earlier blog entry on, “Visual Analytics with Complementary and Analogous Color Harmony,” the Munsell color order system defines hue attributes as actual colors and establishes five principal hues. These principal hues are Red (R), Yellow Y), Green (G), Blue (B) and Purple (P) and are equally spaced in clockwise order around a color circle or wheel. These principal hues are separated by five intermediate or mixture colors. The intermediate hues are defined as Yellow Red (YR), Green Yellow GY), Blue Green (BG), Purple Blue (PB), and Red Purple (RP). The color wheel is measured off in one hundred compass points resulting in 100 steps on the hue circle. Each of the primary and intermediate colors are allocated a range of ten degrees on the color circle and are located at the mid-point of this segment. This presents a challenge in defining a triad color harmony since 10 does not equally divided into three. Below, we show two possible approaches to creating a triad color harmony with the Munsell Color Wheel.

The Isosceles Triad Scheme

In geometry, an isosceles triangle has two sides of equal length. If we apply this concept to the Munsell Color Wheel, stepping four hue spaces from a given hue will yield two hues separated by one space. This forms an isosceles triad color scheme. Below, we depict an example using the Red (5R), Blue (5B) and Green (5G) Munsell hues. We apply this isosceles triad scheme to a visual analytics display of three dimensional stacked bar charts in Figure #1 below.

Figure #1: An Isosceles Triad Color Scheme of Red (5R), Blue (5B) and Green (5G) Munsell hues applied to a three dimensional stacked bar chart example.

 

 

 

 

The Equilateral Triad Scheme

Returning to geometry concepts again, a triangle that has all sides of the same length is defined as an equilateral triangle. Applying the concept to the Munsell Color Wheel, an equilateral triad color scheme can be created by stepping three hue spaces from a given color. Below, we depict an example using Yellow Red (5YR) and the hues that are three steps away, Purple (5P) and Green (5G). We apply this equilateral triad scheme to a visual analytics example of cylindrical three dimensional bar charts in Figure #2.

Figure #2: An Equilateral Triad Color Scheme of Yellow Red (5YR), Purple (5P) and Green (5G) Munsell hues applied to a three dimensional cylindrical bar chart example.

 

Summary

In this short discussion, we have shown how to apply fundamental Euclidean geometry principles that define triangles to building Triad Munsell Color Harmonies. Two examples of an Isosceles Triad Color Scheme and an Equilateral Triad Color Scheme are shown. If you would like to explore color harmony concepts further, please examine Chapter 4: Defining Color Harmony of my book on “Applying Color Theory to Digital Media and Visualization” from CRC Press.

About the Author

Theresa-Marie Rhyne is an expert in the field of computer-generated visualization and a consultant who specializes in applying artistic color theories to visualization and digital media. She has consulted with the Stanford University Visualization Group on a color suggestion prototype system, the Center for Visualization at the University of California at Davis, and the Scientific Computing and Imaging Institute at the University of Utah on applying color theory to ensemble data visualization. Follow the link for more information on her book: “Applying Color Theory to Digital Media and Visualization” is available from CRC Press.

]]> https://munsell.com/color-blog/visual-analytics-color-wheel-triad-harmony/feed/ 0 https://munsell.com/color-blog/iscc-webinar-albert-h-munsell-the-father-of-color-science/ https://munsell.com/color-blog/iscc-webinar-albert-h-munsell-the-father-of-color-science/#respond Tue, 20 Feb 2018 15:34:36 +0000 http://munsell.com/?p=8769 As a part of the ISCC’s webinar series focused on the Munsell Centennial Color Symposium, John Seymour, aka “John the Math Guy,”  will present a webinar: “Albert Munsell – the Father of Color Science?” John Seymour has been writing about … Continue reading →]]>

As a part of the ISCC’s webinar series focused on the Munsell Centennial Color Symposium, John Seymour, aka “John the Math Guy,”  will present a webinar: “Albert Munsell – the Father of Color Science?”

John Seymour has been writing about Munsell for many years, talking about his passion for teaching color. He cites his many accomplishments in the field of color, including:

• The 1899 patent for the color sphere which was intended as a color education tool.
• The 1902 patent for a spinning top where color cards could be affixed to the surface to create various color effects.
• In 1904 he worked with teachers in Boston to standardize the teaching of color and developed the Munsell Crayons.
• In 1906 he patented a color chart (or scale) to order and arrange colors.

But does John think this makes him the “Father of Color Science?” Register for the webinar to find out.

Webinar Details

Topic: Albert Munsell – the Father of Color Science?
Date: February 21st, 2018
Time: 2:00 – 3:00 PM EST
Registration Link: https://iscc.org/event-2806485

In the meantime, you can check out John’s latest posts on this topic:

• Munsell – The Father of Color Science? (part 1)
• Munsell – The Father of Color Science? (part 2)
• Munsell – The Father of Color Science? (part 3)

John Seymour will be a keynote speaker at The Munsell Color Symposium, which will be held June 10th – 15th, 2018 in Boston. Check out this interview with the event co-chairs for more info on the symposium or visit the symposium website.

 

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