OUGD404
An introduction to Colour theory

At the start of this lecture we briefly went into the science of colour theory and how the human eye perceives colour through a physical, physiological and psychological process. The human eye contains two types of receptors, 'Rods' which convey shades of black and white, then 'Cones' which allow the brain to perceive colour. There are three types of cones, type one is sensitive to red-orange light, type two is sensitive to green light then finally type three is to blue-violet light. When a single cone is stimulated, the brain perceives the one corresponding colour.

Once the science part was covered we looked more at colour principles and some of the pioneers behind colour like Johannes Itten and Josef Albers. I done a small amount of research into Josef Albers, he used colours as if they were catalogued components of an optical experiment, he used intense colours to create work that was a transition between  new American and European art at the time. Principles like CMYK and RGB were mentioned, certain aspects I knew of but it was good learn about the print processes for example when billboards are printed in CMYK.

Learning about the dimensions of colour was beneficial because it was bringing back reconigtion of colour facts I learned in school. For example 'Hue' is one colour and 'Colour' is one or more hues. Colour and hue can often be interchangeable terms, chroma refers to all colour including shades, tints and tones. Shades are hues plus black,tints are hues plus white and tones meanwhile are hues plus grey. 

This lecture was helpful because it reintroduced me to facts about colour that I'd forgotten about but it also introduced me to new theories as well.