I’ve noticed throughout my life that red looks very different from green and blue, but when you look at spectral diagrams, red and green are very similar colors, while blue is quite distinct. Why does red look so unique in spite of the fact that it is similar to green and blue ought to be the one that looks very different?
In: Biology
maybe we can go to /r/askdocs or /r/askscience so an optometrist or physicist can answer for sure
Red, yellow and blue are primary. Look at a color wheel. Opposite sides of the wheel will look most different. Blue and green are on the same side of the wheel.
Blue and green are next to each other on the rainbow. Red is one extreme of the rainbow. Green and blue are closer in frequency. The order is red, orange, yellow, green, blue, etc. So red looks like orange the most, while green and blue look alike.
Green is made from blue and yellow so it will look similar to blue, unlike red which is a primary color; you can’t combine any other colors to make red.
A lot of cultures have no distinction between blue and green, in fact! The Japanese word “ao” can mean blue and green.
Blue and green are closer to each other on the visible light spectrum. Blue and green are about 450 and 550 respectively while red is about 750.
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