A Color Notation Part 10

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 22.]

(137) The color score presents four large divisions or color fields made by the intersection of the equator with the meridian of green. Above the centre are all light colors, and below it are all dark colors. To the right of the centre are all warm colors, and to the left are all cool colors. Middle green (5G 5/5) is the centre of balance for these contrasted qualities, recognized by all practical color workers. The chart forms a rectangle whose length equals the equator of the color sphere and its height equals the axis (a proportion of 3.14:1), representing a union and balance of the scales of hue and of value. This provides for two color dimensions; but, to be complete, the chart must provide for the third dimension, chroma.

(138) Replacing the chart around the sphere and joining its ends, so that it re-forms the transparent envelope, we may thrust a pin through at any point until it pierces the surface of the sphere. Indeed, the pin can be thrust deeper until it reaches the neutral axis, thus forming a scale of chroma for the color point where it enters (see paragraph 12).

In the same way any colors on the sphere, within the sphere, or without it, can have pins thrust into the chart to mark their place, and the length by which each pin projects can be taken as a measure of chroma.

If the chart is now unrolled, it retains the pins, which by their place describe the hue and value of a color, while their length describes its chroma.

+Pins stuck into the score represent chroma.+

(139) With this idea of the third color dimension incorporated in the score we can discard the pin, and record its length by a numeral. Any dot placed on the score marks a certain degree of hue and value, while a numeral beside it marks the degree of chroma which it carries, uniting with the hue and value of that point to give us a certain color.

Glancing over a series of such color points, the eye easily grasps their individual character, and connects them into an intelligible series.

(140) Thus a flat chart becomes the projection of the color solid, and any color in that solid is transferred to the surface of the chart, retaining its degrees of hue, value, and chroma. So far the scales have been spoken of as divided into ten steps, but they may be subdivided much finer, if desired, by use of the decimal point. It is a question of convenience whether to make a small score with only the large divisions, or a much larger score with a hundred times as many steps. In the latter case each hue has ten steps, the middle step of green being distinguished as 5G-5/5 to suggest the four steps 1G, 2G, 3G, 4G, which precede it, and 6G, 7G, 8G, and 9G, which follow it toward blue-green.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 23.

COLOR SCORE--(or N 6 in Plate III)--GIVING AREAS BY H, V AND C.]

+The score preserves color records in a convenient shape.+

Such a color score, or notation diagram, to be made small or large as the case demands, offers a very convenient means for recording color combinations, when pigments are not at hand.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 24.]

(141) To display its three dimensions, a little model can be made with three visiting cards, so placed as to present their mutual intersection at right angles (Fig. 24).

5G 5/5 is their centre of mutual balance. A central plane separates all colors into two contrasted fields. To the right are all warm colors, to the left are all cool colors. Each of these fields is again divided by the plane of the equator into lighter colors above and darker colors below. These four color fields are again subdivided by a transverse plane through 5G 5/5 into strong colors in front and weak colors beyond or behind it.

(142) Any color group, whose record must all be written to the right of the centre, is warm, because red and yellow are dominant. One to the left of the centre must be cool, because it is dominated by blue.

A group written all above the centre must have light in excess, while one written entirely below is dark to excess. Finally, a score written all in front of the centre represents only strong chromas, while one written behind it contains only weak chromas. From this we gather that a balanced composition of color preserves some sort of equilibrium, uniting degrees of warm and cool, of light and dark, and of weak and strong, which is made at once apparent by the dots on the score.

(143) A single color, like that of a violet, a rose, or a b.u.t.tercup, appears as a dot on the score, with a numeral added for its chroma.

A parti-colored flower, such as a nasturtium, is shown by two dots with their chromas, and a bunch of red and yellow flowers will give by their dots a color pa.s.sage, or "silhouette," whose warmth and lightness is unmistakable.

The chroma of each flower written with the silhouette completes the record. The hues of a beautiful Persian rug, with dark red predominating, or a verdure tapestry, in which green is dominant, or a j.a.panese print, with blue dominant, will trace upon the score a pattern descriptive of its color qualities. These records, with practice, become as significant to the eye as the musical score. The general character of a color combination is apparent at a glance, while its degrees of chroma are readily joined to fill out the mental image.

(144) Such a plan of color notation grows naturally from the spherical system of measured colors. It is hardly to be hoped, in devising a color score, that it should not seem crude at first. But the measures forming the basis of this record can be verified by impartial instruments, and have a permanent value in the general study of color. They also afford some definite data as to personal bias in color estimates.

(145) This makes it possible to collect in a convenient form two contrasting and valuable records, one preserving such effects of color as are generally called pleasing, and another of such groups as are found unpleasant to the eye. Out of such material something may be gained, more reliable than the shifting, personal, and contradictory statements about color harmony now prevalent.

CHAPTER VII.

COLOR HARMONY.

+Colors may be grouped to please or to give annoyance.+

(146) Attempts to define the laws of harmonious color have not attained marked success, and the cause is not far to seek. The very sensations underlying these effects of concord or of discord are themselves undefined. The misleading formula of my student days--that three parts of yellow, five parts of red, and eight parts of blue would combine harmoniously--was unable to define the _kind_ of red, yellow, and blue intended; that is, the hue, value, and chroma of each of these colors was unknown, and the formula meant a different thing to each person who tried to use it.

(147) It is true that a certain red, green, and blue can be united in such proportions on Maxwell discs as to balance in a neutral gray; but the slightest change in either the hue, value, or chroma, of any one of them, upsets the balance. A new proportion is then needed to regain the neutral mixture. This has already been shown in the discussion of triple balance (paragraph 82).

(148) Harmony of color has been still further complicated by the use of terms that belong to musical harmony. Now music is a _measured art_, and has found a set of intervals which are defined scientifically. The two arts have many points of similarity; and the impulses of sound waves on the ear, like those of light waves on the eye, are measured vibrations.

But they are far apart in their scales, and differ so much in important particulars that no practical relationship can be set up. The intervals of color sensation require fit names and measures, ere their infinite variety can be organized into a fixed system.

(149) Any effort to compare certain sounds to certain colors soon leads to the wildest vagaries.

+Harmony of sound is unlike harmony of color.+

(150) The poverty of color language tempts to a borrowing from the richer terminology of music. Musical terms, such as "pitch, key, note, tone, chord, modulation, nocturne, and symphony," are frequently used in the description of color, serving by a.s.sociation to convey certain vague ideas.

(151) In the same way the term _color harmony_, from a.s.sociation with musical harmony, presents to the mind an image of color arrangement,--varied, yet well proportioned, grouped in orderly fashion, and agreeable to the eye. But any attempt to define this image in terms of color is disappointing. Here is a beautiful Persian rug: why do we call it beautiful? One says "because its colors are _rich_." Why are they rich? "Because they are _deep in tone_." What does that mean? The double-ba.s.s and the fog-horn are _deep_ in tone, but not necessarily beautiful on that account. "Oh, no," says another, "it is all in _one harmonious key_." But what is a key of color? Is it made by all the values of one color, such as red, or by all the hues of equal value, such as the middle hues in our color solid?

(152) Certainly it is neither, for the rug has both light and dark colors; and, of the reds, yellows, greens, and blues, some are stronger and others weaker. Then what do we mean by a key of color? One must either continue to flounder about or frankly confess ignorance.

(153) Musical harmony explains itself in clear language. It is ill.u.s.trated by fixed and definite sound intervals, whose measured relations form the basis of musical composition. Each key has an unmistakable character, and the written score presents a statement that means practically the same thing to every person of musical intelligence. But the adequate terms of color harmony are yet to be worked out.

Let us leave these musical a.n.a.logies, retaining only the clue that _a measured and orderly relation underlies the idea of harmony_. The color solid which has been the subject of these pages is built upon measured color relations. It unites measured scales of hue, value, and chroma, and gives a definite color name to every sensation from the maxima of color-light and color-strength to their disappearance in darkness.

(154) Must not this theoretical color solid, therefore, locate all the elements which combine to produce color harmony or color discord?[32]

[Footnote 32: Professor James says there are three cla.s.sic stages in the career of a theory: "First, it is attacked as absurd; then admitted to be true, but obvious and insignificant; finally it is seen to be so important that its adversaries claim to be its discoverers."]

(155) Instead of theorizing, let us experiment. As a child at the piano, who first strikes random and widely separated notes, but soon seeks for the intervals of a familiar air, so let us, after roaming over the color globe and its charts, select one familiar color, and study what others will combine with it to please the eye.

(156) Here is a grayish green stuff for a dress, and the little girl who is to wear it asks what other colors she may use with it. First let us find it on our instrument, so as to realize its relation to other degrees of color. Its value is 6,--one step above the equator of middle value. Its hue is green, G, and its chroma 5. It is written G 6/5.

(157) Color paths lead out from this point in every direction. Where shall we find harmonious colors, where discordant, where those paths most frequently travelled? Are there new ones still to be explored?

(158) _There are three typical paths: one vertical_, with rapid change of value; _another lateral_, with rapid change of hue; and a _third inward_, through the neutral centre to seek the opposite color field.

All other paths are combinations of two or three of these typical directions in the color solid.

+Three typical color paths.+

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 25.]

(159) 1. The vertical path finds only lighter and darker values of gray-green,--"self-colors or shades," they are generally called,--and offers a safe path, even for those deficient in color sensation, avoiding all complications of hue, and leaving the eye free to estimate different degrees of a single quality,--color-light.

(160) 2. The lateral path pa.s.ses through neighboring hues on either side. In this case it is a sequence from blue, through green into yellow. This is simply change of hue, without change of value or chroma if the path be level, but, by inclining it, one end of the sequence becomes lighter, while the other end darkens. It thus becomes an intermediate between the first and second typical paths, combining, at each step, a change of hue with a change of value. This is more complicated, but also more interesting, showing how the character of the gray-green dress will be set off by a _lighter_ hat of Leghorn straw, and further improved by a tr.i.m.m.i.n.g of _darker_ blue-green. The sequence can be made still more subtle and attractive by choosing a straw whose yellow is _stronger_ than the green of the dress, while a _weaker_ chroma of blue-green is used in the tr.i.m.m.i.n.g. This is clearly expressed by the notation thus: Y 8/7, G 6/5, BG 4/3, and written on the score by three dots and their chromas,--7, 5, and 3 (see Fig. 23).

(161) 3. The inward path which leads by increase of gray to the neutral centre, and on to the opposite hue red-purple, RP 4/5, is full of pitfalls for the inexpert. It combines great change of hue and chroma, with small change of value.

(162) If any other color point be chosen in place of gray-green, the same typical paths are just as easily traced, written by the notation, and recorded on the color score.