Secondary color

Short description: Color made by mixing two primary colors

The basic colors of pigments: primary cyan, magenta, and yellow, blended to form secondary red, green, and blue.

A secondary color is a color made by mixing of two primary colors in a given color space.

## Contents

* 1 Additive secondaries
* 1.1 Light (RGB)
* 2 Subtractive secondaries
* 2.1 Printing (CMYK)
* 2.2 Traditional painting (RYB)
* 3 See also
* 4 References

## Additive secondaries

Main page: Additive color

### Light (RGB)

Main page: RGB color model

For the human eye, good primary colors of light are red, green, and blue. Combining lights of these colors produces a large range of visible colors.

red | (●) | \+  | green | (●) | =  | yellow | (●)

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green | (●) | \+  | blue | (●) | =  | cyan | (●)
blue | (●) | \+  | red | (●) | =  | magenta | (●)

That is, the primary and secondary RGB colors (with secondary colors in boldface) are:

red

yellow

green

cyan

blue

magenta

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Combining RGB colors means adding light (thus the term "additive color"), and the combinations are brighter. When all three primaries are combined in equal amounts, the result is white.

The RGB secondary colors produced by the addition of light turn out to be good primary colors for pigments, the mixing of which subtracts light.

## Subtractive secondaries

Main page: Subtractive color

Pigments, such as inks and paint, display color by absorbing some wavelengths of light and reflecting the remainder. When pigments are combined, they absorb the combination of their colors, and reflect less. Thus, combining pigments results in a darker color. This is called subtractive color-mixing, as mixing pigments subtracts wavelengths from the light that is reflected.

### Printing (CMYK)

Main page: CMYK color model

The mixture of equal amounts of these colors produce the secondary colors red, blue, and "lime" green (the RGB primary colors of light), as follows:

cyan | (●) | \+  | magenta | (●) | =  | blue | (●)

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magenta | (●) | \+  | yellow | (●) | =  | red | (●)
yellow | (●) | \+  | cyan | (●) | =  | green | (●)

That is, the primary and secondary CMY colors (with secondary colors in boldface) are:

cyan

blue

magenta

red

yellow

green

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Ideally, combining three perfect primary colors in equal amounts would produce black, but this is impossible to achieve in practice. Therefore a "key" pigment, usually black, is added to printing to produce dark shades more efficiently. This combination is referred to as CMYK, where K stands for Key.

### Traditional painting (RYB)

Main page: RYB color model

Before the discovery of CMY, at least as far back as Goethe, the best primary colors were thought to be red, yellow, and blue. Mixing these pigments in equal amounts produces orange, green, and purple:[1]

red | (●) | \+  | yellow | (●) | =  | orange  | (●)

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yellow | (●) | \+  | blue | (●) | =  | green | (●)
blue | (●) | \+  | red | (●) | =  | purple | (●)

That is, the primary and secondary RYB colors (with secondary colors in boldface) are:[2]

red

orange

yellow

green

blue

purple

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## See also

* Color theory
* Color wheel
* List of colors
* Primary color
* Tertiary color
* Neutral color

## References

1. ↑ Sometimes called violet. This model is commonly used in painting today.
2. ↑ RGB approximations of RYB tertiary colors, using cubic interpolation

* v
* t
* e

Color topics

* Red
* Orange
* Yellow
* Green
* Cyan
* Blue
* Indigo
* Violet
* Purple
* Magenta
* Pink
* Brown
* White
* Gray
* Black

Color science|

| Color physics|

* Electromagnetic spectrum
* Light
* Rainbow
* Visible
* Spectral colors
* Chromophore
* Structural coloration
* Animal coloration
* On Vision and Colors
* Metamerism
* Spectral power distribution

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Color perception|

* Color vision
* Color blindness
* Achromatopsia
* test
* Tetrachromacy
* Color constancy
* Color term
* Color depth
* Color photography
* Spot color
* Color printing
* Web colors
* Color mapping
* Color code
* Color management
* Chrominance
* False color
* Chroma key
* Color balance
* Color cast
* Color temperature
* Eigengrau
* The dress

Color psychology|

* Color symbolism
* Color preferences
* Lüscher color test
* Kruithof curve
* Political color
* National colors
* Chromophobia
* Chromotherapy

Color
philosophy|

| Color space|

* Color model
* additive
* subtractive
* Color mixing
* Primary color
* Secondary color
* Tertiary color (intermediate)
* Quaternary color
* Quinary color
* Aggressive color (warm)
* Receding color (cool)
* Pastel colors
* Color gradient

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Color scheme|

* Color tool
* Monochromatic colors
* Complementary colors
* Analogous colors
* Achromatic colors (Neutral)
* Polychromatic colors
* Impossible colors
* Light-on-dark
* Tinctures in heraldry

Color theory|

* Chromaticity diagram
* Color solid
* Color wheel
* Color triangle
* Color analysis (art)
* Color realism (art style)

Color terms|

| Basic terms|

* Blue
* Green
* Red
* Yellow
* Pink
* Purple
* Orange
* Black
* Gray
* White
* Brown

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Cultural differences|

* Linguistic relativity and the color naming debate
* Blue–green distinction in language
* Color history
* Color in Chinese culture
* Traditional colors of Japan
* Human skin color

Color dimensions|

* Hue
* Dichromatism
* Colorfulness (chroma and saturation)
* Tints and shades
* Lightness (tone and value)
* Grayscale

Color
organizations|

* Pantone
* Color Marketing Group
* The Color Association of the United States
* International Colour Authority
* International Commission on Illumination (CIE)
* International Color Consortium
* International Colour Association

Lists|

* A–F
* G–M
* N–Z
* List of colors (compact)
* List of colors by shade
* List of color palettes
* List of color spaces
* List of Crayola crayon colors
* history
* Color chart
* List of fictional colors
* List of RAL colors
* List of web colors

Related|

* Vision
* Image processing
* Multi-primary color display
* Quattron
* Qualia
* Lighting
* Local color (visual art)

* Category
* Index of color-related articles

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