Color Properties

Hue

Hue defines pure colors in terms of red, green or blue. Hue also defines mixtures of two pure colors like red-yellow or yellow-green.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tint

A tint is a mixing result of an original color to which has been added white. If you tinted a color, you've been adding white to the original color.

 

Shade

A shade is a mixing result of an original color to which has been added black. A shade is darker than the original color.

 

Tone

Tone is result of mixing a pure color with any neutral/grayscale color including the two extremes white and black. By this definition all tints and shades are also considered to be tones.

 

Lightness or Value = Tone in percentage

Lightness is usually one property of three when used to determine a certain color and measured as percentage value. Lightness defines a range from dark (0%) to fully illuminated (100%).Any original hue has the average lightness level of 50%. Lightness is the range from fully shaded to fully tinted. Value or tone is a measure of how light or dark a color is, without any consideration for its hue.

 

Saturation or Chroma

Saturation is usually one property of three when used to determine a certain color and measured as percentage value. Saturation defines a range from pure color (100%) to gray (0%) at a constant lightness level. A pure color is fully saturated. Saturation is the purity of a color. The chroma or saturation of a color is a measure of how intense it is. High saturation colors look rich and full. Low saturation colors look dull and grayish.

 

 

Intensity / Luminosity

It can be used in conjunction with any color property. Luma (%) is the intensity of the achromatic signal contributing to our color perception.

 

Brightness / Luminicance

Brightness is an attribute of our perception which is mainly influenced by a color's lightness. For one color of specific hue the perception of brightness is also more intense, if we increase saturation.

 

Gray Scale

A grayscale is a series of neutral colors, ranging from black to white, or the other way around. Each step's color value is usually shifted by constant amounts.