2. The Qualities of Color and Their Measurement

Having introduced the reader, how­ever slightly, to the fascinating, but often puzzling, theoretical aspects of color, we turn now to color as an artist sees and uses it. It is our aim to keep this volume as free as pos­sible from technical terms. Some are bound to creep in, however, and, as we approach exercises in which "hue," "value," "intensity" and related terms must be employed, it becomes imperative to offer a few definitions and explanations. We shall confine ourselves, however, to the vocabulary of the artist, ignoring, for the most part, that of the scientist.

Qualities of Color

If we look at any given color analyt­ically — the red of an apple, for instance — we discover that it pos­sesses three outstanding character­istics or qualities. First, there is that quality by which we recognize one color from another, and which we suggest by its name. This we call "hue." The apple is red; red is the hue (name) of the color. Remember the equation: "Hue equals Name."

We can alter the hue of a color by mixing another color with it. If we mix red pigment with yellow pigment, we produce orange pigment; this is a change of hue.

Next comes the quality by which we discern lightness or darkness in a color. This we call "value." It is by value that we are able to discrimi­nate between light red and dark red.

By mixing a color with something lighter or darker than itself, we change its value. If we mix black or white (or water, in the case of watercolor pigments) with a color, we change its value but not its hue.

A color in its full, natural strength may be called a "normal" color or a color of "normal" value. If lighter, we call it a "tint"; if darker, a "shade." These latter terms are so often abused that some authorities prefer the substitution of the word "value," as a "light value of blue" rather than a "tint of blue," or a "dark value of green" rather than a "shade of green." "Tone" is a word of ambiguous meaning which is often employed in a general way to include all normal colors, tints and shades. Some authorities, however, use it to refer specifically to grayed values of any hue. Thus, color mixed with white would be described as a tint; color mixed with black, a shade; and color mixed with both black and white, a tone. If these words were always used in just this way, it would doubtless be easier to communicate color distinctions more accurately than we now do, but in common usage all three words are used al­most interchangeably.

Some colors are strong and some weak. The quality by which we distin­guish strength or weakness in a color is called "intensity." If we remark that an object is colorful or strong in color, we refer to its intensity.

We can change the intensity of a normal color by mixing it with other hues; this tends to dull or gray it. We can change intensity without changing value or hue by the addition of neutral gray of equal value.

This quality which we call "in­tensity" is also called "chroma" or "saturation" and the value of a color is sometimes termed "brightness" or "lightness." Though these particular differences in ter­minology are of slight consequence to the average artist, they emphasize the unfortunate confusion of terms which exists in the entire field of color.

Take, for instance, the matter of color names. There are literally thousands with new ones invented every day by imaginative copywriters. Few are truly descriptive. There are colors named for flowers or plants, such as rose, violet, indigo; for fruits — orange, plum, peach, lemon; for places — Antwerp blue, Nile green; for persons — Hooker's green, Payne's gray, Rembrandt's madder. The inadequacy of such terms is evident. As A. H. Munsell asks in his book, A Color Notation: "Can we imagine musical tones called lark, canary, cockatoo, crow, cat, dog or mouse, because they bear some distant resemblance to the cries of those animals?"

Aside from color names, there are many other color terms equally ambiguous or un-standardized, such as those just presented in our descrip­tion of color qualities. The scientist wrangle over one lot of words, this colorists over another, and neither group has developed a universally accepted terminology, comparable to that of music. So, despite the wealth of color terms, it is extremely diffi­cult for one to put in words a description of a color scheme, or even an individual hue, with any likelihood of being exactly understood.

This does not mean that no at­tempts have been made to bring order out of this chaos. The problem has long been evident and steps toward its solution have often been undertaken.

First, it has been demonstrated that the color qualities which we have described as hue, value and intensity are measurable, each of them being really a dimension. Color, in other words, is three-dimensional.

Secondly, though no one color yardstick or system of measurement has met with anything approaching universal acceptance or application, several ingenious systems have been devised and are in actual use, par­ticularly in industries where the precise specification of color is of great commercial importance (printing inks, textile dyes and wall paints, for example).

Since the main purpose of most of these systems is to provide an accu­rate means of identifying, specifying or matching colors, each has de­veloped a set of physical standards and notations which, when properly understood, can describe the three dimensions of any color. Although extremely helpful to the color spe­cialist who can interpret them, they are meaningless to the average artist who has little use for them in his own painting.

For those readers who may wish to investigate these systems, we strongly recommend several books which explain more clearly and effec­tively than we could possibly attempt here the theories behind the organ­ization and use of the Munsell, Ostwald and Birren color systems, these three being perhaps the best known and most widely used at the present time. All three systems are covered rather well in Frederick M. Crewdson's Color in Decoration and Design (Frederick J. Drake and Co., Wilmette, III.) and in Faber Birren's New Horizons in Color (Rein-hold). For those who wish a more detailed analysis of the Munsell Sys­tem, there is Munsell's own book A Color Notation. Egbert Jacobson's Basic Color (Paul Theobald), a very lucid, detailed interpretation of the Ostwald System, is well illustrated with many helpful color plates and includes a section analyzing the color schemes of several old and modern masters in terms of the Ostwald theories of color harmony.

As we have stated, however, the average artist finds little use for such systems. We have seen that the artist's concern is less with color theory than with pigments, which are used, for the most part, for pic­turing objects of all sorts as they appear to the eye. And these objects, as well as the pigments themselves, convey color impressions modified by what, for want of a better term, we call texture.

Texture, therefore, though not truly a quality of color, as are hue, value and intensity, is so closely related to these qualities that it must be considered along with them. If one paints an object, he must keep in mind its shape and character as revealed by its color (hue, value and intensity) and texture. The light and shade on objects can be thought of as agents for the expression of shape and texture, as modifiers of color. Even in non-objective paintings, for that matter, texture is a very important factor; since there is no subject interest, texture is often one of the painting's chief attributes. In fact, some non-objective painters are noted primarily for the textures they achieve with unusual materials such as sand or mud, or the fact that they apply their pigments in some unorthodox way, such as dribbling, which cre­ates a particular textural effect.

But, to return to the representation­al painter — or the world as he sees it — it is largely by texture (whether a mere surface texture or a surface revelation of deeper seated physi­cal characteristics) that we know whether a thing is of metal or cloth, wood or plaster. If fabrics of silk, cotton and wool, originally white, are all dyed with the same dye, each can still be identified by its individual textural characteristics. Architects, decorators and designers of all kinds must know the importance of textures and choose such things as build­ing materials, fabrics and finishes according to texture, as well as other characteristics. And the artist, to portray his subjects properly, must express texture together with color, choosing his materials — canvas, paper, pigments, etc. — accordingly. In the final analysis, it is always the artist's eye, and his eye alone, which will be his instrument of color judgment. No systems or theories can ever be of more than limited value. He must learn color mainly through observation of natural colors and through his use of color in pig­ment form. For this reason, we shall place great emphasis, as we go along, on experiments with pigments, or­ganized for the student's own per­formance.

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