Primary and Secondary Colors

Primary colors are those that cannot be obtained by mixing any other and, in this sense, they are known as unique colors. The yellow, the blue and the Red are the ones that have this characteristic.

On the other hand, secondary colors are those that can be obtained from the combination of two primary colors. For example, him Orange is secondary, since it is obtained by mixing red and yellow and the same happens with green, which is achieved by the combination of yellow and blue.

The three primary colors are easily recognizable in nature

Red is found in flowers, blue in the sky and yellow in some animals. The set of colors other than the primary ones are derived from a combination of red, blue and yellow. In other words, by mixing two primaries we get a secondary color.

The diversity of tones that are around us comes from the primary colors, which are visible through the role of light. Colors such as purple, orange or green are some examples of the so-called secondary ones.

Tertiary colors

If a primary color is combined with a secondary color, the final result is one of character tertiary. If we combine red and orange, we get a reddish orange. If we mix the orange with the yellow, the result is a yellow orange.

Color theory and color models

From the different colors and their different combinations we have the possibility to create images associated with ideas or feelings. Color is understood as the way things look due to the different qualities of light. It should be noted that our eyes only perceive the colors that are reflected in the objects by the action of light. This is because the rays of the Sun contain all the colors of the rainbow mixed together and this mixture is known as white light.

When white light hits a white object, the object does not absorb the light, but if this light hits a black object, said object does absorb all the light and therefore we can observe its black color. On synthesis, the white color is the mixture of all the colors of the rainbow and the black is the absence of light.

There are two color models: those of light or those of pigment

The former are known as RGB because they refer to red, green and blue in English (red, green and blue) and are those that are normally used in virtual media (computers, tablets, cell phones...).

Those of pigment, correspond to the acronym CMYK in English, which refer to cyan, magenta, yellow, and lyrics k which refers to black as the key color (mixing the first three colors results in black).

Photos: Fotolia - kesipun / Luis