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Light & Colour Light & Colour Light & Colour

This document discusses properties of light, including that it travels in straight lines and is reflected or refracted at interfaces. It also discusses the measurement of light, different types of light sources, color theory terms, and the structure and function of the human eye in perceiving color. The tristimulus theory of color vision is introduced, which explains that all colors can be described using only three parameters that correspond to the three types of cones in the human eye.

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62 views24 pages

Light & Colour Light & Colour Light & Colour

This document discusses properties of light, including that it travels in straight lines and is reflected or refracted at interfaces. It also discusses the measurement of light, different types of light sources, color theory terms, and the structure and function of the human eye in perceiving color. The tristimulus theory of color vision is introduced, which explains that all colors can be described using only three parameters that correspond to the three types of cones in the human eye.

Uploaded by

Alain Rolle
Copyright
© Attribution Non-Commercial (BY-NC)
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Light & Colour

Rob Scharein

EECE478 – Introduction to Computer Graphics

6 February 2002
Properties of light
• electromagnetic radiation with wavelength between 400nm and
700nm
Properties of light (cont.)
• travels in straight lines unless an interface between two media is
encountered (demo)
• Law of reflection — angle of incidence equals angle of reflection
• Law of refraction (Snell’s Law) — angle of incidence, θ1, is related
to angle of refraction, θ2 , by the equation

n1 sin(θ1 ) = n2 sin(θ2 )

at an interface between media with indices of refraction n1 and n2


• speed of light in a vacuum is defined to be exactly 299,792,458 m/s
(meter defined in terms of speed of light and the second)
• colour is not a physical property of light
Measurement of light
• need to distiguish between radiometric and photometric units
radiometric — measured over entire electromagnetic spectrum
units are: joule watt
photometric — only measured over visible spectrum (from 400 nm
to 700 nm)
units are: talbot lumen candela lux
Light sources
Common light sources differ in the kind of spectrum they emit. There
are two main types of spectra, continuous and line.

continuous spectra — energy is emitted at a wide range of wavelengths

Examples:

• blackbody radiation (demo)


• tungsten light bulbs
• some fluorescent lamps
• sunlight
• electrical arcs (demo)
The Solar Spectrum
Light sources (cont.)
line spectra — energy is emitted at only a discrete set of wavelengths

Examples:

• ionized gases
• lasers
• some fluorescent lamps
hydrogen

helium

oxygen

nitrogen

neon

argon

krypton
carbon

sodium

iron

silicon

magnesium

sulfur

calcium
Structure of the human eye
• eye is basically a camera, with some important differences
• cones are concentrated around fovea
• rods are more sensitive to light than cones
• peak sensitivity at different wavelengths
Colour theory — perceptual terms
Hue — distinguishes amoung colours such as red, green, yellow, or
purple
Saturation — refers to how far a colour is from a gray of equal intensity
• red vs. pink
• pastels relatively unsaturated
• vivid colours are highly saturated (red laser pointer
• white, gray, and black are unsaturated
Lightness — perceived intensity of a reflecting (or emitting) object
Colour theory — colorimetric terms
Objective, quantitative, way of specifying colours is a branch of physics
known as colorimetry.

Dominant wavelength — The wavelength that a light source emits most


of its energy
Excitation purity — Relative amounts of energy emitted at the
dominant wavelength compared to the rest of the spectrum
Luminance — Amount, or intensity of the light
Perceptual term Colorimetric term

Hue Dominant wavelength


Saturation Excitation purity
Lightness (reflecting objects) Luminance
Brightness (self-luminous objects) Luminance
Tristimulus theory of colour vision
• Although a light source can have a very complex spectral
distribution, it was found empirically (first by artists, then by
Helmholtz & Young) that all colours could be described using only
three parameters.
• Colours that “look” the same but have different spectral energy
distributions are called metamers.
• Experimentally verified only recently that this is related to the fact
there are three types of cones in the human eye (for most people).

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