I noticed something...

[Justyn]

Has anyone ever noticed that when five colors need to be picked as a set, the colors black, blue, green, red, and white seem to pop up fairly often? It doesn't happen every time, but often enough for me to notice it.

The five main chromatic dragons from D&D?
Black, Blue, Green, Red, and White.

The five colors from Magic: The Gathering?
White, Blue, Black, Red, and Green.

The five colors of Jade from Exalted?
White, Blue, Green, Red, and Black.

If I'm off base here, let me know; but has anyone else ever noticed this pattern anywhere else?

[Mando Knight]

Has anyone ever noticed that when five colors need to be picked as a set, the colors black, blue, green, red, and white seem to pop up fairly often? It doesn't happen every time, but often enough for me to notice it.

It makes sense. Red, Green, and Blue are three of the more distinct colors and tend to have better value ranges than yellow, orange, or purple. Then black and white are pretty much the best-contrasting colors in existence...

[KerfuffleMach2]

It makes sense. Red, Green, and Blue are three of the more distinct colors and tend to have better value ranges than yellow, orange, or purple. Then black and white are pretty much the best-contrasting colors in existence...

*nods in agreement*

I can't think of a set of five colors without those.

Also, to support this further, look at graphic art. Anything meant for screens has red, green, and blue values. Max of all three is white, and min of all three is black. Anything else is a combo.

[Aptera]

Has anyone ever noticed that when five colors need to be picked as a set, the colors black, blue, green, red, and white seem to pop up fairly often? It doesn't happen every time, but often enough for me to notice it.

If I'm off base here, let me know; but has anyone else ever noticed this pattern anywhere else Yes, linguists find this pattern a lot in color terms around the world. 80% (Roughly) of languages that have 4 basic color terms have white, red, yellow or grue (blue + green, many languages have them as different shades of each other), and black. With 5 color terms blue and green become distinct.

[littlequietguy]

Because I am incredibly annoying it is worth saying that black and white aren't colors. Something like that. Sorry.

[LordZarth]

Because I am incredibly annoying it is worth saying that black and white aren't colors. Something like that. Sorry.

*facepalm*

[Tirian]

I can't think of a set of five colors without those.

I can think of one, plus two groups of six colors that aren't an extension of those five. (For lulz, I'll leave it as a puzzle to identify the sources....)

A) Red, Black, Blue, Pink, Yellow

B) Blue, Orange, Green, Pink, Yellow, Brown
C) Red, Yellow, White, Green, Blue, Purple

[Flickerdart]

If I'm ever designing anything that needs multiple colours, I'm totally using CMYK. Additive colours are for squares, man, it's all about the pentiums subtractive ones.

[leafman]

I think we see those colors in many (often fantasy) setting because of what the colors are often used to represent.

Blue - Water
Red - Fire
Green - Earth/Plants
Black - Darkness
White - Light

Fire, Water, and Earth are 3 of the 4 elements from ancient Greece, the fourth being Air which doesn't generally have an associated color.

[Fiery Diamond]

I think we see those colors in many (often fantasy) setting because of what the colors are often used to represent.

Blue - Water
Red - Fire
Green - Earth/Plants
Black - Darkness
White - Light

Fire, Water, and Earth are 3 of the 4 elements from ancient Greece, the fourth being Air which doesn't generally have an associated color.

And when Air is given a color, it is generally Purple, Yellow, or Green.
Also, Brown is often used for Earth.

[valadil]

Yes, linguists find this pattern a lot in color terms around the world. 80% (Roughly) of languages that have 4 basic color terms have white, red, yellow or grue (blue + green, many languages have them as different shades of each other), and black. With 5 color terms blue and green become distinct.

Black and white almost always come up first. Red and blue/green are next. This is almost always true. I think yellow usually comes up after that. Blue is often the last one to be distinguished. As you mentioned, green and blue are usually considered close enough (Egyptian poetry uses the same color for sky and grass). Blue also comes up last because primitive people didn't have blue objects. They saw the sky, but there was nothing blue to hold onto, so they had less use to distinguish it as a color.

[Zeful]

And when Air is given a color, it is generally Purple, Yellow, or Green.
Also, Brown is often used for Earth.

True, but Air is also given Silver or Really Light Blue.

Oh and Tirian, those are lists of Power Ranger Colors, the first being the original season.

[Thrawn183]

Please let no one get into color theory...

[Tiktakkat]

If I'm ever designing anything that needs multiple colours, I'm totally using CMYK. Additive colours are for squares, man, it's all about the pentiums subtractive ones.

Already did that.
A set of slaadi with divine spell-like abilities, color coded CMY.

[Gorgondantess]

And then there's BlondeYellow, Blue, Brown, Orange Pink and White in another set.:smallwink:

[Athaniar]

I am a fervent devotee of RGB, the One True Color Model. The five colors mentioned in the original post are the core colors of that model. That's why.


And when Air is given a color, it is generally Purple, Yellow, or Green.
Huh? I don't think I've ever seen any of those colors associated with that element. In my mind at least, air is usually white or a pale blue, earth is brown or occasionally grey, fire is red or orange, and water is anywhere between blue and green.

[Kobold-Bard]

I can think of one, plus two groups of six colors that aren't an extension of those five. (For lulz, I'll leave it as a puzzle to identify the sources....)

A) Red, Black, Blue, Pink, Yellow

B) Blue, Orange, Green, Pink, Yellow, Brown
C) Red, Yellow, White, Green, Blue, Purple

POWER RANGERS!!!! :smallbiggrin:


.....Yes I'm a nerd, you have a problem with that?

[ZeroNumerous]

Red, Brown, Blue, White, and Yellow. Together, they summon Captain Planet.

[Ichneumon]

Because I am incredibly annoying it is worth saying that black and white aren't colors. Something like that. Sorry.

I'm sorry, but you are both physically and linguistically wrong.

If I hold a white paper in my hand and ask "What colour is this?" everybody is going to reply white and not "it doesn't have a colour". The same is true for black.

Different colours are created because objects absorb some light waves while they "bounce back" others. This is what we perceive as colours. White and black are only created when ALL or None of the light is bounced back, this is, in essence. They are the extremes, but they certainly are colours.

[Tavar]

Random geek knowledge!
Black objects actually don't absorb all light. In fact, somewhat recently they made a better black using carbon nano-tubes that absorbed more light than traditional blacks.

[Zeta Kai]

Even moar geek knowledge!

Just yesterday, scientists announced that gene therapy was able to give adult monkeys the ability to see in colors that they were previously unable to before. Male rhesus monkeys lack the photoreceptors to detect the difference between red & green (apparently they see only grayscale, with blue & yellow in the mix). But after 5 months of gene therapy, they reached a critical mass of new photoreceptors, & started being able to tell the difference between a red button & a green one. Science marches on, & one day color blindness in humans may be curable.

[factotum]

And a white object doesn't actually reflect ALL the incident visible light, either, any more than a red object will only reflect one specific frequency of light--there's usually a range involved. A true "black body" (a body that absorbs all incident radiation without reflecting anything at all) is a theoretical concept in physics; everyone knows that it's impossible to ever achieve in the real world.

[Tequila Sunrise]

Because I am incredibly annoying it is worth saying that black and white aren't colors. Something like that. Sorry.
Half correct; white is a color because it is a combination of all primary and secondary colors; black is not a color because it is the absence of color.

/nitpick

[Froogleyboy]

Because I am incredibly annoying it is worth saying that black and white aren't colors. Something like that. Sorry.

Um . . . what? ninja basterds

[Icewalker]

Yeah, RGB are used because they are our base three colors, the three colors we see and of which all our other colors are made.

Of course, when you're dealing with paint rather than light, the three base colors are actually red, blue, and yellow.

[Kcalehc]

Of course, when you're dealing with paint rather than light, the three base colors are actually red, blue, and yellow.

And unfortunately, unlike light, you can't mix them all to make white; you get an awful sickly brown looking colour (at least with cheap powder paints anyways).

[factotum]

Of course, when you're dealing with paint rather than light, the three base colors are actually red, blue, and yellow.

I thought with paint it worked the same way as it does with printer inks--namely, cyan, magenta and yellow are the base colours, because they're a subtractive medium as opposed to the additive medium of pure light.

[tribble]

I can think of one, plus two groups of six colors that aren't an extension of those five. (For lulz, I'll leave it as a puzzle to identify the sources....)

A) Red, Black, Blue, Pink, Yellow

B) Blue, Orange, Green, Pink, Yellow, Brown
C) Red, Yellow, White, Green, Blue, Purple

Ahttp://thelittlecriminal.files.wordpress.com/2009/06/power-rangers_turboranger1.jpg
GO GO POWAH RANGAHS!