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Color is the impression produced by a tone of light in the visual organs, or more precisely, it is a visual perception that is generated in the brain of humans and other animals by interpreting the nerve signals sent to it by photoreceptors in the retina of the eye, which in turn interpret and distinguish the different wavelengths they pick up from the visible part of the electromagnetic spectrum.
Every illuminated body absorbs one part of the electromagnetic waves and reflects the rest. The reflected waves are captured by the eye and interpreted in the brain as different colors according to the corresponding wavelengths.
The human eye only perceives the wavelengths when there is abundant illumination. In low light it sees black and white. In the superimposition of light colours (called “additive colour synthesis”), the colour white results from the superimposition of all colours, while black is the absence of light. In the mixture of pigments (called “subtractive colour synthesis”), whether it is paints, dyes, inks or natural dyes to create colours, white only occurs if the pigment or the support is of that colour, reflecting all white light, while black is the result of the complete superposition of the colours cyan, magenta and yellow, a mixture which to some extent manages to absorb all the wavelengths of light.
White light can be broken down into all the colours of the visible spectrum by means of a prism (refractive scattering). In nature this decomposition gives rise to the rainbow.
In the art of painting, graphic design, visual design, photography, printing and television, colour theory is a set of basic rules for mixing colours to achieve the desired effect by combining colours of light or pigment. The color black can be produced by combining the pigment colors: cyan, magenta, yellow; and while combining the light colors: red, green and blue produces the color white.
In summary, the combination of the pigment colors (cyan, magenta, yellow) subtracts light, as its name indicates, and the color black is obtained. And the combination of the light colors (green, red, blue) adds light, and the color white is obtained.