Color Gamut
The gamut is the set of possible colors within a color system. No one system can reproduce all possible colors in the spectrum.
Unfortunately for designers, it is not possible to create every color in the spectrum with either additive or subtractive colors. Both systems can reproduce a subset of all visible color, and while those subsets generally overlap, there are colors which can be reproduced with additive color and not with subtractive color and vise-versa.
©1998 ACM |
The colors that can be created by each system are called a "gamut". The ACM diagram to the left, shows the relative gamuts of additive (monitor display) and subtractive (printed) color. The larger area on the graph represents all visible color. | |
Describing Color
There are lots of different ways to describe color. These are some of the most common terms you'll hear. Click on any one to learn more.
| Term: |
What it describes: |
| Hue |
The name we give to a distinct part of the spectrum—"red" "yellow" "purple" |
| Saturation |
The "purity" of a color—how much Grey is or isn't in it. |
| Value (or Intensity or Lightness) |
The "brightness" or "darkness" of a color, the amount of a brightness, light, or white in the color. |
| Primary |
The three defining colors of a color wheel, from which all other colors are built. |
| Secondary |
The three colors created by blending two primary colors. |
| Tertiary |
The six colors created from the three primary and three secondary colors. |
| Complementary |
Colors at opposite sides of the color wheel, high contrast with each other. |
| Triad |
Set of three colors equidistant around the color wheel. |
| Analogous |
Colors next to each other on the color wheel. |
| RGB |
Red, Green, Blue. The primary colors in the additive model. |
| CMYK |
Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, Black. The primary colors in the printer's version of the subtractive model. Black is added to the mix for sharpness of the printed image. |
If you want to dig even deeper into color theory, both Kodak and press/pre-press vendor Heidleberg offer some good reality-based educational material. Check out the Kodak Digital Learning Center, which has a tutorial series on color theory.
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