The number of discernible colours

✍ Scribed by M. R. Pointer; G. G. Attridge

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 1998
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 28 KB
• Volume: 23
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0361-2317
• DOI: 10.1002/(sici)1520-6378(199802)23:1<52::aid-col8>3.0.co;2-2

✦ Synopsis

How many colours can the eye distinguish? The A simple system would have the red, green, and blue published literature is remarkably inefficient at providing phosphor dots comprising each pixel either ''off '' or an answer to this important question. An often quoted ''on'' leading to 2 3 , or 8, possible colours; this is obvireference states that ''10 million surface colours can be ously a restricted gamut that would lead to poor quality distinguished by the normal human eye under optimum of colour reproduction of pictures. However, there are observing conditions.'' Unfortunately, the authors fail to applications where it is perfectly adequate, for example, provide any further information as to the origin of this when displaying coloured text on a coloured background. figure. This short contribution describes some of the his-A more advanced system allows the number of colours torical attempts at answering the question, and then sugto be increased by introducing a display controller. This gests a realistic solution.