The Amazing Math behind Colors!

In this video, I talk about the math and science of colors for 42 minutes. Topics include cone cell response functions, electromagnetic radiation, spectral colors, luminance, color spaces, parametric equations, normal curves, mono and polychromatic light, emission spectra, spectral power distributions, chromaticity diagrams, linear transformations, the physics of diffuse reflection and light sources, blackbody radiation, sunlight, refraction, rainbows, rayleigh scattering, fluorescence, LEDs, color gamuts, CRT TV, LCD screens, CMYK printers, the RGB cube, binary, hexadecimal codes, the HSV color space, cylinder and cone, and color schemes. This is my entry in #SoME2
Corrections/Clarifications:
37:10 I misspoke and said m1 instead of m2. What is shown on screen is correct.
22:12 On screen it says λ = f/c, but this is wrong. The correct formula is λ = c/f
I have been told by some commenters that the long cone responsivity graph has a smaller, secondary peak, in the shorter wavelengths, and this is a reason why monochromatic violet appears more red than a pure blue. I have found conflicting information on this though. Either way, the way the brain interprets colors is extremely complicated, involving something known as the opponent process.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opponen...
Intro song: 1812 overture by Tchaikovsky (specifically the U Vorot Vorot part)
Outro song: Waltz of the Flowers also by Tchaikovsky
Chapters:
0:00 Intro
1:04 Cone cells
5:10 Spectral colors
8:20 Color spaces
13:34 Polychromatic light
16:13 Chromaticity diagram
21:09 Physics of reflection
23:25 Blackbody radiation
26:58 Luminescence
28:42 Computer Screens
30:58 Printers
32:28 RGB cube
35:23 HSV color space
40:00 Color schemes
41:46 outro

[@notexactlysiev]

This is probably the best explanation of color on the internet. And believe me I've watched/read so many. But none of them answered all the questions I had about color vision and color spaces as clearly and as detailed as this one. Brilliant. Looking forward to watching the rest of your stuff!

[@user4241]

Yeah, but this video has some important mistakes. For example, cyan actually *is* in the visible color spectrum, it's just that the picture is wrong.

[@BogdanBaudis]

@@user4241 Be careful when you say "spectrum", because it may mean the part of electromagnetic field oscillations (photons) which human eye can detect or the gamut of colors which people sense. Both overlap but not in a simple way; for example: people sense colors which they cannot find in the physical spectrum. Sensed color is a psycho-physiological phenomenon, a result of physical stimuli but only after many stages of processing. There is some evidence that that it may be even social. Quite often people cannot agree of what color some thing actually is ...(remember the Great "Blue" Dress Debate?)

[@FuriousTortoise]

Kuvina explained this in the video so it’s likely user4241 made it 5:20 into this 42:34 length masterclass, threw their hands up, and bounced. The “spectrum” is the slice of visible wavelengths along the electromagnetic spectrum (wavelengths are monochromatic by definition). Kuvina explained this is the reason we utilize normalized responsivity to construct the “visible gamut” from perceived color. The vast majority of colors we perceive in everyday life are not single wavelengths so this derived gamut allows us to populate the rest of that color space in a mathematically sound way. Bonus that it maps onto our “Newton’s prism spectrum” in a way Newton would likely nut over. TLDR: Kuvina explained that the band of color dispersed from a prism are not monochromatic (unlike a mathematically exact nm spectral chart) and this dispersion and subsequent retinal perception creates that cyan (and many others) user4241 said Kuvina left out.

[@BogdanBaudis]

@@FuriousTortoise You correct. In fact 40 or so minutes is way not enough to cover the subject of color perception and production. My 1st experience with it was reading a (East?) German (translated to Polish) book on the subject a long time ago, but with beautiful illustrations, it was "only" 400 pages long and it did not cover yet the computer vision or the newer neuroscience. But it went deep in the reproduction of the color in print and photography. Unfortunately I cannot recall the title ... Long story short this subject calls for at least a two-semester course 🙂

[@FuriousTortoise]

@@BogdanBaudissure is! Maybe even a lifelong pursuit 😉. I have a bunch of color theory and vision books. My prize is first edition “A Color Notation” by Munsell with all the plates. I’ve got some key books by Itten, Josef Albers, Gage, and James Gurney too. Beyond that we have a new wealth from graphic designers and CGI experts! They’re arguably more in tune with color than most painters in physical media because of how demanding their job is over realistic representation.

[@gregmark1688]

The very moment I was thinking "Is he going to leave _anything_ out?" you broke out an explanation of converting hex to decimal. It just doesn't get any better than this.

[@SoloX_official]

blud they're non-binary

[@user-nm7gb3rw9c]

@@SoloX_official don't care + didn't ask + L take + lmao

[@strawberry_cake1703]

​@@user-nm7gb3rw9cyou're so sad

[@HopeOrLunarEclipse]

@@user-nm7gb3rw9cWell you still should respect their pronouns. SoloX_official was just trying to inform someone who may not have known. I do like your profile though.

[@PeterHarveyUK]

I am approaching the age of seventy. I have found myself confused over the course of my conscious life by every account of colour that I have ever come across. This is the very first account of colour which I have found comprehensible. It is the best thing on the subject I have ever seen. I learned an immense amount from this video, the conistent quality of which astonishes me. I salute you, Kuvina Saydaki. Thank you, thank you, thank you!

[@davidhawkeye2298]

A year on and I find myself in a very similar position with regard to colour science. I agree completely with your sentiments.

[@haipingcao2212]

You're -old-

[@athko]

this is so well made :D

[@Kuvina]

thank you!

[@jan_Eten]

@@Kuvina Ðe binary says *:) i love you

[@Kuvina]

@@jan_Eten Thank you! I believe you're the first one to translate it!

[@jan_Eten]

@@Kuvina I love your videos, and are excited for Explaining Every Sorting Algorithm (part 3). I use ðe set of colors wiþ 3-depþ (where r, g, and b can all be eiðer 0%, 50%, or 100%), but will use ðe colors wiþ 5-depþ (adding 25% and 75%) when necessary. My favorite color is azure (#0080FF). Also, my pfp is my own personal flag.

[@HopefullyJustMe]

@@jan_EtenYou use þ and ð intentionally? Absolute legend 🫡

[@rsa5991]

There is one important thing, that is easy to miss: the values 0..255 in "RGB" are *not* true RGB values - they are square roots of RGB values! That means, that the "middle" value of 128 is not 50%, but only 25% brightness. If you mix colors in that non-linear "RGB", you'll get darker colors, than they should be! The reason for that is CRT monitors, that had quadratic response to input voltage. To save money on consumer side, they decided to put correction on the production side. Also, human perception is more sensitive to darker colors, so it was also a kind of proto-compression. This is the #1 mistake of programmers, who work with colors - it has even snuck in a common software, like browsers. If you mix two RGB values, you should always square them first, mix, and then sqare root them. * To be exact, they are not even square roots, they are 2.2-degree roots.

[@mina86]

To be extra pedantic, they aren’t even 2.2-degree roots. sRGB gamma compression function is piecewise of a linear function at low values and exponential with 2.4 power. ;)

[@bob-ny6kn]

Interesting. What is your preferred source?

[@aaabbb-gu5pz]

Interesting and important information, please recommend some book with detailed description!

[@rsa5991]

@@aaabbb-gu5pz ​ @bob Sorry, cannot help you, as I did not get this information from a book. But searching for the term "sRGB" should point in the right direction.

[@aaabbb-gu5pz]

@@rsa5991 thank you, will research more and this video is excellent guide.

[@Kavukamari]

ive been reading stupid scientific papers about CIELAB and all these color spaces for months but this is the first time ive genuinely felt like i had an intuitive understanding on this topic. Thank you.

[@ace4x3]

I'm so happy this got recommended to me. This video is criminally underrated!! The quality is insane. Thank you for making this. It was a very interesting watch. You have a very good sense for explaining things :D

[@aaabbb-gu5pz]

And I'm shock about the youtube recommendations. It simply HIDEs the information that the customer searches! Why, google?! 😈😡

[@angrymidget4728]

This is single handedly the best, most robust, comprehensive and informative video about colors in all of the internet! I hate that the algorithm took 10 freaking months to bring this to my feed! I was geeking out throughout the whole thing. The marriage of the topics of arts (color), physics (waves), biology (perception), chemistry (pigments), astronomy (stars), computer science (hex & HSV) and math has never been this seamless and well connected in any video I've encountered. It clearly shows how much you yourself have been intrigued in these topics and how much you've thought about the relationships between it all, and as someone with shared interests, I literally turned into the neuron activation and pointing rick dalton memes every other minute. Not only that, but every time you went onto a small tangent, you made sure to sprinkle in a "well, no, actually" and proceeded to make the viewers informed about the intricacies of the tangent instead of simplifying it too much and moving on. (For example, fact about responsivity and normalized was new to me. And also Newton taking a dumb liberty + supernumerary bands forming purple. And also how Sun's spectrum isn't ideal due to non-uniformly traveling light.) Absolutely outstanding job! If I were to provide some suggestions, the first would be at about 11:45 where you start introducing colors (purple) outside the curve. You could've sprinkled in stuff like how the light waves, the conversion of light to signals, and the interpretation of signals to color are independent phenomena. Meaning, the brain doesn't care whether it is sensing 'light', but only that it's receiving some kind of 'signal' about the environment. Consequently, if the brain is receiving a signal that peaks at the short and long cones, it will find a way to interpret that as well. But how would the eye even manage to sense receive light that simultaneously triggers both cones if all the wavelengths in the visible spectrum only trigger colors in the curve? And the answer to that would your explanation for monochromatic and polychromatic light. I think it would be a great transitional segment to your excellent presentation. There's nothing wrong with your explanation. It's just that as someone who has studied this topic, I can fill in the gaps with my own knowledge, but a beginner might not. I think it would be cool to let viewers know that not only are colors non-existent/imaginative in nature, but also that the color purple quite literally doesn't even exist! Like, it's not even an interpretation of wavelengths by the brain but something the brain just made up! *cue exploding brain* The second suggestion would be at 30:10 where you brush over the luminance part. I am personally not well-informed about the details in this specific part, so I just accepted it as is. A bit more could've been nice. And also about how light polarization is utilized in LEDs. Anyways, this comment is long enough and you probably won't even see it. I just wanted to express my appreciation for the work and informative quality you've put into this video. You've made my day!

[@Kuvina]

Thank you so much! I do in fact read every comment, and this is possibly the most comprehensive one I've received!

[@savagesarethebest7251]

LED does not need to utilise polarisation, LCD does. In a short version you could say it is a bastardisation of subtractive and additive colours.. 🤔 An LCD works by shining white light through a liquid crystal, and because of the polarisation that is applied by that sub pixels value it will be blocked by the fixed polarisation filter. A fun thing to do if you have such eye glasses you can remove the filter from a display and other people will just see more or less that you stare at a pure white screen 👓 🤓😎

[@PeterNerlich]

This is so amazing, I'm not even halfway through but this is exactly what I need. I've been learning a lot how to think about colors not only in RGB/HEX values for websites but for print over the last year, but I knew I was missing some solid fundamentals. I'm at the CIE 1931 xy Cromaticity Diagram right now, I think once I reach the end of the video I'll be totally enlightened :D

[@Kuvina]

thank you! I'd like to think my videos are things people didn't know they needed.

[@MrApolloTom]

A really excellent video. As a painter I would like to add a bit about subtractive mixing. C, M, and Y are a good compromise set of primary subtractive colours but don't really make the definitive three primaries in the same way that additive primaries do. One reason is that when they're mixed, there's a loss of saturation, so while you can make a version of every hue with CMY, you can't mix every colour at full saturation. For this reason painters will often choose different primaries in their palette. With orangy red and a yellow you can make a more saturated range of oranges, but won't be able to make a strong purple with the red. With magenta, yellow, and an ultramarine blue you can make a better range of strong purples than CMY but only a duller orange or turquoise. The second issue with subtractive mixing is that you get the wavelengths that the two primaries share in common. If you had a hypothetical red pigment that reflected a pure red wavelength only, and an equivalent blue, they would mix to black! But you could have a red and a blue that look exactly the same to the eye, but that reflect more of a mix of wavelenths. These would mix to a purple of some sort. The conclusion is you can't predict exactly how subtractive pigments will mix just by their visual appearance! Thanks and best wishes, Tom

[@user4241]

In theory, mixing CMY pigments shouldn't make the colors loose saturation. In practice and in my experience (with my printer, lol) blues and greens usually loose saturation, but reds and pinks are excellent. It would be interesting to see the result of mixing high-purity cyan, magenta, and yelllow pigments.

[@AJMansfield1]

This is an excellent introduction to color math! I would love to see a part 2 to this as well, covering things like Color Rendering Index (CRI), perceptual color spaces (CIELAB, HSLuv, etc), and the different types of colorblindness. Colorblindness especially is something that's often misunderstood as a complete lack of color-processing ability, where in the most common forms just have a slight shift in the response curves for M cones (as in deuteranomaly) or L cones (as in protanomaly) so they overlap way more -- effectively, making the red-to-green side of the chromaticity chart "shorter".

[@vaclavtrpisovsky]

Yes, the CRI being left out is a bit unfortunate, as is the omission of white LEDs. Otherwise, this is a great source for the basics of how color _actually_ works, and I understand that conciseness was the priority this time.

[@LumenPlacidum]

For years I gave a project to my Linear Algebra classes to research and describe how vectors and linear transformations have to do with supposed "color spaces". Congratulations! You've beaten them all 😂. This is officially one of my favorite videos on KZbin.

[@DaveDomonoske]

This is an unbelievably high quality video. Thanks.

[@lishlash3749]

Excellent analysis of chromaticity and RGB color theory, which explains the physiological response of the eye to visible light. For your next project, I'd suggest an exploration of Opponent Color Theory, which explains the brain's psychological response to color and the phenomenon of metamericism. Briefly, the optic nerves between the eye and brain combine the RGB components from the cone cells into sum and difference vectors which the brain interprets as a pair of orthogonal color axes: a red-green axis and a yellow-blue axis. Each distinct area of color in the visual field is mapped into a position on each axis according to its chromaticity relative to its perceived background. These two-axis coordinates are interpreted by the brain as the metamerical hue of each perceived area of the visual field. Opponent color theory explains how different RGB combinations can produce the perception of the same psychological hue. Also why we can perceive shades such as greenish-blue and reddish-purple, but not yellowish-blue or greenish-red.

[@jacksong8748]

Wow, this video really unified my understanding of color! Not just on screens, but in general. The explanations of the relationships between the ways we represent and model color were succinct and clear. I came in with a decent grasp of most of these concepts, but this really drove home the connections between them all, thank you!!

[@Gwinkie]

Congrats on being one of the SoME2 honorable mentions! This video was fantastic as are the rest of your videos, I hope you make many more in the future

[@Kuvina]

thank you so much!

[@xanderlinhares]

This is so good. You don’t know how many times I’ve tried to fully understand a chromaticity diagram. Well done!

[@PretzelBS]

Literally everything you could ever want to know about colours. Now I wanna build flashlights with specific wavelengths and combine them to see the forbidden colours

[@Creepystutorials]

This video blew my mind!! Everything there is to say, everything there is to explain in ONE VIDEO! Spittin' out facts and entire collections of knowledge like a waterfall, just as you go. Incredible.

[@davehowe6685]

You’ve answered so many of the questions I’ve collected over decades of work with color in information technology! I finally understand how a spectral range from red to violet is perceived/represented in a color wheel. You’ve even answered questions I hadn’t considered. Thank you!

[@loftyTHEOWNER]

One of the best math videos I've seen in my life. I'm gonna suggest it to my professor of the neurosensory class

[@koacado]

Came here after watching the Technology Connections video on Brown. You did an amazing job especially explaining how the different eye cells react to wavelengths to produce our perception of color, I understand that much better now. Thanks for the amazing work!🎉❤

[@markbordelon1601]

The pace, scope, sequence of presentation are perfect in this video. Would that all instructional videos were like this! You would be that person who could adequately and succinctly explain quantum mechanics in a video.

[@jonahansen]

This is a fantastically detailed and accurate treatment of the physics, biology, and psychology of color perception. I've never seen anyone bring it all together like this. What a great production!

[@chengong388]

This is the best explanation of color space, especially how there are areas with a corresponding LMS activation values but impossible to see, always wondered about those.

[@elidoz7449]

in the video is mentioned the super-green which is impossible to see in theory, but actually you can. you can look into a magenta color with high value and high saturation to get the red and blue cones tired, then you look at green, and there won't be those red and blue cones in your way (not as much, it's still impossible, but you can get close to it)

[@TupperWallace]

@@elidoz7449 Very interesting idea! So afterimages formed by selective color viewing could open up a whole new perceptive color gamut. Someone with understanding of cone-tiring could make a unique video of impossible colors by alternating certain bright colors with a white screen. New frontiers in psychedelics!!

[@nathanruiz3424]

I love these kinds of in depth videos. Litterally everything you know about colors is in this video. You have answer all my questions I had about color, introduced new questions, then solved those as well. Great Job!

[@readyplayer2197]

There is no better way to explain this! You have no idea how thankful I am! Thank you!

[@DigitalJedi]

I love the math behind colors. I'm colorblind (defective S-cones), so in a way it's my only way of working with all the colors. I've been working on some image recoloring shaders, including ones that treat each color value as a probability of the pixel still having that color.

[@jimmylightfinger1216]

This was a great submission...so much ground to cover on a subject of great complexity and some subjectivity. I much appreciate how it was concluded with the cone representation: neat amd tidy.

[@JeffHanke]

Great video! I'll add one thing I discovered while looking into colors: painters refer to a color mixed with white a "tint" (e.g. ice, mint, ivory, etc. in the diagram), with gray a "tone", and with black a "shade" (e.g. navy, burgundy, pine, etc. in the diagram). They can be useful when designing a color scheme.

[@tanzimulemam5820]

Honestly one of my favorite videos ever. Amazing job!

[@Mikelaxo]

All of this information compiled into a full course would be awesome

[@cmbates4053]

This video is by far the best I’ve seen on Color science. Great job. Thanks for the hard work. Cheers

[@OmegaFalcon]

This is the video about color I've ALWAYS wanted!!! Such a beatiful explanation of it all 😍 Omg you even named the 12 main colors around the hue circle, and now i finally have good a word to call each of them!

[@CubOfJudahsLion]

"Green?" "Hypergreen." No single video I'd seen before explains SO much about the nature of color. What a treasury of knowledge, this is. Thank you.

[@Zero-4793]

this video validates so many of my thoughts, and complaints. i absolutely agree with you about ROYGBIV and i didnt know the history. i always wondered why they ignore cyan.

[@renegadethesandwing02050]

this is by far my new favorite math channel 11/10 videos

[@FindLiberty]

Love it - Beautiful review of color language with updates through computer age. *Thank you!* This made me reflect on and better understand my 50 year journey from photography, NTSC waveform/vectorscope, optics, computers to _now_ discover the human eye/brain color "timing" concept here, and Fourier Transforms/Physics to create Attosecond Laser pulses _Oct 2023._ What a trip!

[@brittmurray9818]

Great video. Really. My wife was laughing about how many times I said "Ohhh!" in moments of realization. This video made the lightbulb over my head light up a number of times, as it were. Thanks!

[@chair547]

I've heard claims floating around that you can see invisible Colors by abusing the fact that when neurons fire too often their outputs are ignored by the brain. The idea is, for example for hyper green you can stare at a red image for a long time until the neurons that carry short cone information are deactivated and then quickly switch to a green image while those neurons are still deactivated and that will let you see hyper green but I don't know how true it is

[@astra1288]

I looked for a video on this exact topic about a month ago and was super bummed to not be able to find stuff aimed at beginners to these concepts like me. I resolved to just not understand any of this until youtube did its job for once and recommended this fantastic video to me. Many thanks!!

[@BS-bd4xo]

I love #SoME2. So many new chanels that bring such high quality content! I've always really wanted to know about how colours actually work and this video was such a good explainer! Thanks

[@utubespazum]

This was a really good explanation. You deserve way more views on this video. I studied Physics but have recently started trying to learn to paint, and I think for this reason the KZbin algorithm recommended me your video. And it was actually exactly what I wanted, without even knowing I was looking for it. An easy to understand but mathematically vigorous explanation of colour. I actually can't believe this video was suggested to me, it has been so useful!

[@nitsanbh]

This is, hands down, the best yt vid about the science behind colors

[@JDMDPHD]

Excellent excellent video, simplified but without unnecessary reduction that obscures the bigger picture.

[@elkinmontoya9640]

Holy Fuck, so much information in a single video. This is without a doubt a classic in KZbin educational videos

[@matveyshishov]

Can't thank you enought!!! You have a tremendous talent for exploring a set of related concepts and then explaining them in a well-designed and cleanly structured manner!

[@ItsRyanStudios]

This is awesome I'm a scientist/ engineer and also an oil painter. I'm fascinated by the intersection of the two. Having an understanding of color science has made painting much more intuitive, while having an artistic eye for color has made life so much more interesting, since every play of light and color in daily life, is so much more apparent.

[@ryanstout22]

Great work on this video. I've studied color stuff for years (wrote RAW converters for cameras, image processing pipelines, etc..) and I still learned things! Keep up the good work!

[@mdlhvn]

This video is greatly helpful for me and my students in the course "Chemistry and Physics of Colors" at Soka University of America. Thank you very much!

[@CompilerHack]

I have been obsessing over colours for the past month and I must say, this is the best video on the matter, possibly the best internet resources short of actual books and even then it's good cuz of the video visualisations! Thank you so much

[@BariScienceLab]

Congrats on Honorable mention! This is a really cool video -- I always wondered if colors are actually a real physical phenomena or simply a figment of the human subjective experience.

[@empirechen]

The highest information density I have ever seen in any video

[@zeroglyphniner5183]

Me: I wonder what aspect of colour this video will focus on? This video: YES!

[@tszyn]

I wanted to understand how the familiar CIE color space diagram is derived, but after reading/watching other explanations on the Internet, I still couldn't grasp how it follows from the 3D "physiological" space where L, M, S responses are separate dimensions. Your explanation filled in most of the blanks for me - now I understand it's a projection onto an equal-luminance plane. In general, I think this is a stellar explanation of color - precisely in the right order, starting from physiology, and no glossing over important details. It must have taken a lot of time to structure this so well. Terrific job!

[@lemonke8132]

Holy shit this is such a comprehensive and efficient video i rarely get the pleasure of witnessing such a perfectly paced masterpiece such as this

[@chinarin]

astonishingly & beautifully explained: methodical, complete, the points explained in a good order, with distinction between what's actually happening vs what's perceived. ahh and the explanations are so clear and presented well graphicallyyyy! and there's the underlying light-hearted vibe tops it off. honestly, one of the best presentations i've ever seen on anything.

[@Schaex1]

A week back I wrote a program in Java that takes any color in RGB, HEX, DEC, HSB/HSV, HSL and CMYK and converts them into all the other representations in the respective color spaces. It can also display the standard color chooser to get an input as well. While searching for ways to do those transformations I also found the conical 3d-representation of HSV. I didn't quite understand it back then and just took the formulae for granted, which worked fine and the program did what I wanted, but it was not until I found this video until I felt like I actually understand what's going on. Thank you a lot for the video! I really liked how you were able to combine so much biology, quantum mechanics, mathematics and color theory in one concise lecture. I'm pretty sure there is a lot more but this already felt like a lot to take in at once and I'm certain that I now understand this topic a lot better. You definitely got a well deserved follow and recommendation to my friends for this one!

[@tesseralis]

I've similarly been obsessed with colors through my life (including making a color system similar to yours!) but this is the best explanation for how colors work I've ever seen!

[@user4241]

What do you mean? He didn't create any system, he is just explaining them.

[@edmundfeingold]

This is the he best video I have ever seen explaining color in all its human manifestations. Thank you for taking the time to put it together.

[@Red-mq2no]

Thank you for this video! I was searching for a fun, detailed, and audience focused primer on the science of color after stumbling upon a technical presentation video of Colorimetry by Radiant Vision Systems that, while informative, had sub-optimal sound quality and narrative design. Your video was just perfect for me! The concept flow and explanations were well architected, it was engaging, and most of all I had fun while enjoying learning about this subject. You clearly put a lot of love, knowledge, and thought into these video. Thank you for sharing your artistic creation and making these concepts more accessible. I'm now subscribed and will be working my way through your other videos. 💜😊

[@dokuo9619]

This deserves millions of views, i have zero stem background and yet you made it all make absolute sense

[@christopherrice891]

I love the scent of complicated Math concepts in the morning😌 I've been trying to wrap my mind around connecting colors and Math but until just now, i had no KZbin video to teach it to me. You just made my day! Please respectfully go into as much detail as you want about color+Math.

[@AaronJarecki]

This was obviously a ton of work. Thank you so much. Literally every bit of information you provided was interesting, which is remarkable for a video of this length.

[@plantnt489]

This is the most complete and easy to understand video about colors I've seen

[@James-bv4nu]

What about colors you've never seen?

[@sonobox-lu6mr]

This is a very nice video. I teach data science at a university. when I talk about graphics, the choice of colors is always very important. I always recommend the HCL color space, which makes it easy to make "evenly spaced" colors and palletes for people with a color blindness (which affects something like 8% of all males).

[@ilyalevin123]

What a detailed and comprehensive explanation! I thought I knew the subject, but it turned out it was only a small fraction

[@johnchessant3012]

I had no idea this was gonna be so interesting!! Really great video covering so many different topics in that intersection between your passions of math and color!

[@paultashkent5225]

I didn't see how long this video was when I clicked it and only now, 23 minutes in, I realised I've been watching for that long, wow. I've been switching from video to video this evening and somehow this got me stuck. Good choices of what to what keep and cut. Amazing video 👏

[@DavidSartor0]

Thank you for the video. I learned things. I was hoping you would mention chimerical colors, aphakia, or tetrachromacy. Relearning things in more depth was nice, too.

[@nice3294]

I love how it starts with the details of how light is percieved before introducing how colour systems work

[@TheOneMaddin]

Interestingly, the light from the sun is not just white by coincidence. But we evolved to see it as white. If the sun would be hotter, therefore more bluish, we would probably have evolved to still see it as white. Same with more red stars.

[@BorisJensen]

Very well done, thanks a lot. I really appreciate the depth and how one subject led to another, good structure and good coverage of all the questions I came up with as I as watched :)

[@Kuvina]

Corrections/Clarifications 1. 37:10 I misspoke and said m1 instead of m2. What is shown on screen is correct. 2. 22:12 On screen it says λ = f/c, but this is wrong. The correct formula is λ = c/f. 3. A common question: Why does a spectral violet (~410 nm) appear slightly reddish, when it's only the short cones that are active? Shouldn't it appear the same as a pure spectral blue (~440 nm)? I have been told by several commenters that the responsivity function for the long cones has a very small secondary peak around the shorter wavelengths like violet. However, I have found conflicting information on this. Either way though, the way that the brain makes colors is very complicated, involving something called the opponent process. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opponent_process The reason this makes spectral violet appear slightly reddish can be found here: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Violet_(color)#Optics 4. It is possible for some people to see impossible colors by staring at a single color in order to "tire out" one of the cone types. Then, when you look at a different color, some of the cones don't activate like they usually do, because they're "worn out" so to speak. The effect only lasts a few seconds. But be warned, you should never try this with bright lights. They can do permanent damage. More information can be found here: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impossible_color 5. In the video, I never explicitly mentioned it, but the Arabs discovered all that stuff about optics way before Newton did. Notably Alhazan en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ibn_al-Haytham#Book_of_Optics

[@Tynach]

That answer about violet looking reddish is false, there is no secondary bump for 'L' cones. I wrote a more detailed response to that here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/nZ-4iqKHZtWqm9U&lc=UgxVyExreeBhb3pmFzt4AaABAg.9v-8BLkdGCE9vDkqZQuMJB The true answer, is that the color you would see if you were to somehow stimulate each of the three cone types separately without the other, is not what people think those colors would be. The closest colors in the sRGB gamut, while still preserving the correct hue, would be (in hexadecimal color code form): L: FF0057 M: 00FFD9 S: 7E00FF Though, that's using sRGB chromaticities as they are, but using cone spectral sensitivities that are newer than the curves used to measure the sRGB parameters. That is, I used the CVRL's LMS→XYZ matrix to calculate the colors for the LMS primaries. If I use an older (but sensibly calculated and considered to be fairly accurate) LMS→XYZ matrix such as the 'Hunt-Pointer-Estevez' one, we get: L: FF0074 M: 00FFD2 S: 8A00FF These values are only correct for sRGB displays, though. And honestly, I didn't bust out my calculator and whatnot, but used some GLSL shaders I wrote a while back; if my GPU is approximating any of the calculations, they'll be somewhat off. Still, they should be more or less reasonable approximations for the hues of the cones' "primary colors".

[@deathracoffee]

This is the video I was looking for! Thanks, Kuvina, this is incredible!

[@GeirBordalen]

Brilliant and very learning walkthrough of something I thought I knew. I stand corrected - even after close to 40 years in tech (broadcaster). Thanks a lot!

[@renzotorr537]

what an amazing video !! i'll be recommending this a lot. i've been reading a lot about TV tech, lights and color lately and this not only has summed up lots of it, but it also cleared up some stuff i had missed.

[@null6757]

This is by far the most comprehensive and easy to digest explanation of color I've seen. Great work!

[@SteveAcomb]

Thank you so much for making this! I was looking for good approximations of the LMS responsivity functions for so long! I’d love to see more from you on this stuff, it’s right at the intersection of so many of my passions too!

[@wijithagorakanage4560]

You have combined so much information from all the fields into a single video here. Thanks for producing this.

[@obliqueObloquy]

Wow, this video was great. Thorough and in depth explananations with cute art and excellent graphs? Time to binge the rest of your stuff and show this video to all of my friends

[@MaleGeminiCat]

A lot of information -> great editing -> simple and straight explanation -> good job! This is a great video about color and the mathematics!

[@Encysted]

This answers so many questions I’ve had, and answers them so well and understandably. Thank you!

[@ThongNguyen-fl9jp]

thanks, this is probably the best and most thorough explanation of color in one video i've seen! i will rewatch this again and again. thank you!

[@bardes18]

Wow, this is like a whole semester's worth of classes on a single video. The visualizations and the writing are top notch would have loved to have this to study, great work!

[@amay_singh]

I have been eagerly trying to understand precisely these concepts for months!!! Here lies all of it, packed in just a 40 min video. Thank You. ✨✨👏👏

[@SuperSeaguard]

I love how much work you put into your videos! Keep it up!

[@CarlosBonin]

Kuvina, this is, and I can't stress this enough, BY FAR the most comprehensive explanation on colors. It answered basically all my questions. Thank you a lot. I will share this video to everybody, now!

[@willynille6383]

Wow, very impressive how you tied it all together, yet still made it understandable!

[@GodmanchesterGoblin]

This video is just so impressive. I knew a bit about RGB vs CMYK vs HSV, light sources such as white LEDs (often blue with yellow phosphor), etc, but this one video added so much more. Thank you for making it and for the time and effort that went into it. I only wish I had seen something like this about 15 years ago.

[@cristinaaugegiribet1236]

Wow they really explained every topic regarding color. I'm so glad I found this channel

[@mrigeoy]

What a great video! I had a very superficial idea of how colour space works but this has clarified things enormously and tied what I already knew together. Thank you!

[@walravenwill735]

Such a great video! Thank you for your effort! I’ve learned quite a lot, look forward to your next work

[@besknighter]

I've been into color theory and color science for a long while now but could never wrap my head around the chromaticity diagram and the cie xyz color space. BUT THIS VIDEO DID IT! I wish you could see my face when it finally clicked. I audibly gasped and said "OH! I GOT IT!". Thank you sooo much for this video!

[@utkarshkothimbire1484]

Thanks a lot for making ghis detailed video. I had to go through it multiple times to understand.

[@3g0st]

I am also interested in intersections~ Medicine, Math and Art/Music all coming together for me as I keep learning. The math being tacked on a little too late so thank god for everyone on youtube. it is making my move into digital art soooo much easier . Tysm for helping teach concisely. Really good work!

[@weak7897]

This is probably the best video I've seen about color in my life thank you

[@discreet_boson]

I've always been curious about maths in graphics, this video explained it perfectly!

[@carpenterhillstudios8327]

Exhautive description that seems to cover dimensions that traditiinally are kept separate like the role of our brains (and attendant unique sensory expereince) in the apercception of color. And yet- the math driven by a desire for systemization is compelling. Your final arrangements are a breath of fresh air because they are oriented in a circular base other than 6 and provide a home for white and black. thank you for your curiosity and drive to make sense (literally) of this subject.

[@school6268]

This was such a good video 🥲 love how you actually went (somewhat) into each topic you covered instead of straying away from the nonessential stuff. Some people might like the more “focused” kind of video, but I thought you did a great job of visiting a bunch of different topics but still keeping it unified