What is black?

[Radshooter]

Please help my wife win a bet. They are trying to decide if the color black is a complete abscence of color, or the combination of all colors. We are saying a combination of all colors, because abscence of color is clear. Her coworkers say black is abscence of any color. What do y'all think?

 

[PRyker]

Well known fact: a convergence of all colors... happens in nature all the time.



Phil

 

[RBratby]

the color black is the presence of all colors. white is the absence of all colors. they say to wear white on hot days because it reflects all the colors of the spectrum and keeps you cooler then black does.

 

[jmeehan]

It's probably just the engineer in me, but I'd say black is the absence of all light.

 

[cap-n-cray]

As an artist, black is not a "color" in pigment terms. Black is a shade or tone. It is the darkest of all shades or tones. Black in visual light terms is absence of light, as in dark. All pigment colors mixed together equally is a muddy gray.



Cary

 

[fest3er]

A quick look in any cloudless night sky will give you the answer: stars emit light. That's why the sky is basically black except where there are stars (and other spacial bodies and matter that reflect light).







N

 

[NPloysa]

Spacial. That's a funny word. I'm spacial cause I ride the short bus!



Anyway, yes, black is absence of light, or absence of reflected light.

 

[fkovalski]

Why not just take those in arguement out to your truck and point to the inside if the tailpipe Point and say: "There is black. " :-laf

 

[RT66DOC]

Right on! Ain't physics great?



"Black light"--the real black light not the UV ones--is no light. No wavelength, no color, no nothing... . pitch black nothing... .

Like a black hole.

 

[Mike Ellis]

Black is the absence of color/light.



There are different mechanisms for color, depending on the circumstance. For instance, you have the color of ordinary objects that you see - some wavelengths are absorbed, some reflected or transmitted. When you look at a red truck, the paint reflects the red and absorbs the rest. A black object absorbs all wavelengths, so what you are seeing when you look at a black object is the ABSENCE of light. A white object reflects all colors, so when you look at something white you see all wavelengths.



Mixing colors produces different results because of this, depending on whether the media is emissive or not. Paints, crayons, etc are not normally emissive - each color is caused by the reflection of only a portion of the spectrum. If you shine white light on red paint, since it reflects red it has "subtracted" or absorbed the blue and green wavelengths. If you mix in green and blue paint, you end with a dark color because TOGETHER they absorb the whole band of wavelengths - the red soaks up blue and green light, the green soaks up red and blue light, the blue soaks up green and red light - all the bases are covered, so to speak, and not much light at all is reflected by the end product.



But on your computer monitor, if you mix red, green, and blue you will end up with white. Why? Because the monitor is emissive - each dot actually emits light of a particular color. If you have 3 tiny tiny dots right by each other, all the same brightness, one red, one green, one blue, to your eye it looks like all three colors are coming from the same spot - and it looks white. If you have a black spot on the monitor, the dots in that region are not emitting any light.