Color Vocabulary

Additive color- This is how light produces color, these colors are red, green, and blue, or RGB. It starts with the color black, and then adds red, green, and blue light to produce the visible spectrum of color.

Subtractive Color- When several pigments are added together, this causes the number of light waves to be subtracted and then it creates a new color. The theory starts with white, the color that has no waves subtracted, and then ends with black, where all waves are subtracted here.

Complimentary Colors- Looking at a color wheel they are the colors that contrast each other the most and are across from each other on the wheel.

Analogous Colors- These are the colors that are next to each other on the color wheel.

Triadic Colors- These are three colors that are equal distance between all of the colors. For example, yellow, red, and blue.

CMYK Color- This is a subtractive color model that uses four colors and is what is found in printers. The colors are cyan, magenta, yellow, and key (black).

RGB Color- This stands for Red Green Blue and are the primary colors in the additive color theory. This represents the colors that are used on a digital screen.

Cool Colors / Warm Colors- Cool colors are colors that are calming and soothing, such as blue, green, and purple. While warm colors are the colors that are associated with the feeling of warmth, such as red, orange, and yellow.

Hue- This is the color or the shade. Typically, a gradation or tint of a color.

Saturation- This is how vivid a color is or how intense the color appears.

Luminance / Value- Luminance is how intense the light of an object is, or how bright it appears to be. Value is how light or dark a certain hue or color can be.

Grayscale- This is a scale that is composed of gray shades that range from white all the way to black.

Monochromatic-This means that something only contains one color or one hue.

Tint- This is the variety that comes from a color, also known as the shade.

Tone- Referring to how light or how dark something is.

Shade- This is a mixture of black to any hue that is found on the color wheel.