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Color Spaces
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| The Additive RGB Colors
The cone-shaped cells inside our eyes are
sensitive to red, green, and blue. We perceive all other colors as
combinations of these three colors. Computer monitors emit a mix of
red, green, and blue light to generate various colors. For instance,
combining the red and green "additive primaries" will generate
yellow. The animation below shows that if adjacent red and green
lines (or dots) on a monitor are small enough, their combination
will be perceived as yellow. Combining all additive primaries will
generate white.
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| The Additive RGB Color
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| The Subtractive CMYk Colors
A print emits light indirectly by reflecting
light that falls upon it. For instance, a page printed in yellow
absorbs (subtracts) the blue component of white light and reflects
the remaining red and green components, thereby creating a similar
effect as a monitor emitting red and green light. Printers mix Cyan,
Magenta, and Yellow ink to create all other colors. Combining these
subtractive primaries will generate black, but in practice black ink
is used, hence the term "CMYk" color space, with k standing for the
last character of black.
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| The Subtractive CMYk Color
Space |
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| The LAB and Adobe RGB (1998) Color Spaces
Due to technical limitations, monitors and
printers are unable to reproduce all the colors we can see with our
eyes, also called the "LAB" color space, symbolized by the horseshoe
shape in the diagram below. The group of colors an average computer
monitor can replicate is called the (additive) sRGB color space. The
group of colors a printer can generate is called the (subtractive)
CMYk color space. There are many types of CMYk, depending on the
device. From the diagram you can see that certain colors are not
visible on an average computer monitor but printable by a printer
and vice versa. Higher-end digital cameras allow you to shoot in
Adobe RGB (1998), which is larger than sRGB and CMYk. This will
allow for prints with a wider range of colors. However, most
monitors are only able to display colors within sRGB.
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