Color Theory: After Image Lecture
Below are examples
of Simultaneous Contrast / After Image. What is an After Image?
When your eye fatigues, your eye creates an exact
opposite Hue, Value, and Intensity of what you are viewing. Focus on the black
dot in the middle of the orange and blue circles for 15 seconds.
Then focus on the black dot to the right of your screen. What colors do you
see on the white background? What you should see is the exact
opposite Hue (in this case the two hues flip sides). Repeat this exercise with
each set, then study Johannes Itten color wheel below
(notice the color you see is on the opposite side on Itten's color wheel).
Why do we see color?
Below is Johannes Itten Color wheel. Itten's color wheel is still widely used today.
Sir Issac Newton
Sir Issac Newton discovered
that light, when shined through a prism, creates a wide spectrum of color.
His demonstration proved that light creates color (this discovery caused quite
a stir at the time).
Newton also arranged the spectrum of colors onto a wheel (similar to rolling
up a peice of paper).
He organized specific colors
on opposite sides of the wheel still known today as complementary hues.
Newton's discovery eventually led to the understanding of simultaneous
contrast / after image as you just experienced above.
Take note that Newton's
original color wheel contains only 7 colors. Today a 12 hue color wheel is used
by most in the arts.
Sir
Issac Newton
Below demonstrates how colorists organized color to support their theories.
These discoveries
eventually influenced the art world.
Below are examples of 3 artists the were making ground breaking work of their
time period.
Why is the ground breaking? Because science and art were influencing
each other.
Paul Cazanne
Claude Monet
Goerges Seurat
Goerges Seurat
Albert Henry Munsell
What Munsell brought
to the color discussion is an accurate arrangement of color characteristics
(hue, value, and intensity)
Notice how his "sphere" is an irregular shape; whereas, colorists
before him organized color into perfect geometric shapes.
The Munsell Color System is widely used today by paint companies, archeologists
(soil studies), artists, designers, scientists, and many more.
Below demonstrates
a slice of the Munsell sphere illustrated above.
Value: is read vertically
Hue: is read on opposite ends, horizontally (or the exterior of the globe, equator)
Intensity: color becomes less intense towards the center (core, is pure gray)
The Adobe color system
is widely used by artists today.
If you look at Adobe's arrangement of color it does not stray too far from Munsell
color system
Adobe (photoshop, illustrator, after-affects)
Joseph Albers
A student of Johannes
Itten, Albers developed an interest for color interaction.
Below is an exercise Albers used in his Color course at Yale University
Below emphasizes a Contrast of Value (no hue or intensity change)
Below is a black and white version of the image above.
Below emphasizes a Contrast of Hue (no value or intensity change)
Below emphasizes a Contrast of Intensity (no hue or value change)
Joseph Albers, "Homage to a Square"
Kenneth Noland, 1960
Mark Rothko
Barnett Newman
Brigett Riley (Op Art)
Below are relative links to further research and inquiries.
Goethe
Goethe's original proposal was "to marvel at color's occurrences and meanings,
to admire and, if possible, to uncover color's secrets" (Norman,49). To
Goethe it was most important to understand human reaction to color, and his
research marks the beginning of modern color psychology. He believed that his
triangle was a diagram of the human mind and he linked each color with certain
emotions. For example, Goethe associated blue with understanding and believed
it evoked a quiet mood, while he believed that red evoked a festive mood and
was suggestive of imagination. He choose the primaries red, yellow and blue
based on their emotional content, as well as on physical grounds, and he grouped
the different subsections of the triangle by 'elements' of emotion as well as
by mixing level. This emotional aspect of the arrangement of the triangle reflects
Goethe's concern that the emotional content of each color be taken into account
by artists.
Various historical Color Wheels
Various Historical Color Wheels part II
Ewald Hering’s “opponent-color” theory
Goethe and Chevreul (simultaneous contrast)
Ogden Rood (3 attributes to color, Hue, Value, and Intensity)
Tobias
Mayer (Color triangle, mathematician, exhibits the color characteristic,
"intensity"
