RGB or RYB: The Endless Debate Between Computer Scientists and Artists
In elementary school, one of the first things that I learned in art, besides painting a lion that looked like a blob of orange, was the color wheel. The primary colors are red, blue, and yellow. Mix red and blue and you would get purple. Blue and yellow would give you green and red and yellow would get you orange. My art teacher had explained that you could create any hues with the primary colors but you could never actually create them from any other color; you would have to buy those colors from the store.
But, of course, my artistic abilities were terrible and in middle school, I found a profound interest in an area on the opposite side of the spectrum: computer science. It was in this field that I first learned about pixels and that they used the RGB color system. I was very confused by this as I thought that the only color system was the one I learned in art.
I inquired my parents who have great experience in computer science about why yellow was “accidentally” replaced by green in computer science. Both of them replied that the only true primary colors are red, green, and blue and the RYB color system is false.
I would have believed them but I knew from art that blue and yellow made the color green, so I asked them why that occurs. In response, they were confused and said that blue and yellow does not make green but red and green makes yellow. I later found out that they had no clue about art.
Despite my parents’ lack of knowledge in art, they were partially correct about the RGB color system. RGB is valid and is based on additive mixing. Additive is the property of one or more wavelengths of projected light which when mixed produces lighter colors. As a result, mixing red, green, and blue results in white.
This is why RGB is used for devices with screens such as laptops, smart phones, and televisions. As the screens emit light, it makes sense to use an additive color system such as RGB.
On the contrary, RYB is based on the characteristic of subtractive mixing, where it involves objects, in this case pigments, that absorb and reflect light. For example, a red apple will absorb all wavelengths of color except red, which will be reflected back to the viewer. As you mix more colors from the RYB color system, you will get a muddy color but you can never get black. This means that RYB does not include all colors. Does that mean that artists have a faulty color system after all?
Hold on computer scientists and physicists, the artists have a backup plan. After people realized that there was no way to get black from RYB, the CMYK color system was created. The CMYK (Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, Black) includes black, allowing for a wider range of colors than RYB. This subtractive color system is used for printing. More recently, artists are now replacing the old fashioned RYB with CMYK.
In reality, both color systems are valid and efficient in their own ways but I’m just going to stick with RGB since I’m not going to paint a masterpiece anytime soon.
Please reply which color system you like the most and look at the posts below for more information on color systems.
