While daydreamers are famous for spending their afternoons gazing out of their office windows, there’s something to be said for the night sky as well — its intense hues go far beyond an average black sky. Of course, seeing those different colors is all a matter of your where and when. Here are a few examples of how to see the earth’s canvas at its most brilliant.

Photo by mafleen

Blood Moon
The blood moon is also known as the “Hunter’s Moon” or “Sanguine Moon.” While folklore warns that a blood moon is a sign of bad times, the red star of night is anything but. The name “Hunter’s Moon” originates from the fact that this moon cast a brilliant light, allowing hunters to continue to seek prey even at nighttime. Around the time these moons are seen in the sky, there is very little darkness between sunset and moonrise, also making it a favorable time for farmers to work on their crops after sunset (this moon is sometimes called Harvest Moon as well.) This is because the plane of Earth’s orbit around the sun makes a narrow angle as far as the horizon is concerned at this time of year. No matter how much fact stands behind blood moons, some people still continue to think of them as harbingers of doom (but they are really quite the opposite!)

Photo by khalid almasoud

Skylines
While there’s no science behind the beauty of skylines, they certainly hold powerful sway over people, whether it is their own beloved city they are gazing over or someone else’s. Some of the most famous skylines include New York, Paris, Las Vegas, Tokyo, and San Francisco, and it is very popular to photograph them (panoramic shots definitely do the most justice.) The skyline above is Kuwait, gorgeously accented by shades of paprika.


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This is the second post in a series on English Color Etymologies. Today we are looking at the colors that come from the names of food and drinks, fruits and vegetables, along with other miscellaneous names.

English is a colorful language. Since its birth among the tribes of Europe, English has built its color vocabulary with the wealth of words it has inherited from Anglo-Saxon, Norman French, Latin, and Greek. Collected here are 172 colors that standard dictionaries (I used the American Heritage and the Random House) classify as specific color nouns (these do not, of course, include the standard ten – red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple, brown, black, grey, white – or any Crayola inventions). This treasure of colors is broken down by etymological origin: is the color the name of a flower, an animal, or even a historical person? Some colors appear twice (when I felt two origins were sufficiently different). Others appear only once though they could certainly fit into several categories.

Ever wonder how a color got its name? Refer to the following and enjoy your new grasp on color!

FOOD AND DRINKS

Photos by roboppy & waynemah

Things we eat, from wine to liver, have become associated with color.

The fatty component of unhomogenized milk.	Coffee with milk (from the French).
A small cake (from “biscuit”).	A small cake (from the French “twice-cooked”).
A beverage made from the powder of cacao seeds.	The beverage made from roasting and grinding the seeds of the coffee plant.
Burnt sugar.	The vertebrate organ, considered edible.
A dry, red wine made in France’s Bordeaux region.	A beverage made from fermented grape juice.
Fermented, roasted, shelled, and ground seeds from the cacao plant.

FRUITS AND VEGETABLES

Photos by nidriel & targophoto

More specific than foods alone, many fruits and vegetables names have also become the name of the color of their skin.


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The first color wheel has been attributed to Sir Isaac Newton, who in 1706 arranged red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet into a natural progression on a rotating disk. As the disk spins, the colors blur together so rapidly that the human eye sees white. From there the organization of color has taken many forms, from tables and charts, to triangles and and wheels the history.

Using text from Sarah Lowengard’s The Creation of Color in Eighteenth-Century Europe we’re taking a look at the progression of color organization systems and how the color wheel came to be.

A successful color ordering system requires an appropriate shape, the correct number of colors to include, and the proper medium in which to present its information.

The First Color Organization Systems

Gautier’s color-printed picture accompanied one of his many anti-Newtonian publications about color theories. The band of color at the center imitates an illustration in Newton’s Opticks but “proves” Gautier’s assertion that all colors cannot be found in Newton’s spectrum of light.

What is the simplest design that can communicate a relationship among colors? It might be no more than a bar or line, perhaps based on the shape that appears when light is passed through a prism. Bars of colors convey two basic ideas: Color exists and it has a regular order. A linear form hints at a progression that can be linked to wavelengths or cycles, but it does not accomplish much more. It does not suggest complexities of color relationships and so does not validate other aspects of either practices or ideas. The shape and the placement of color may not be arbitrary, but the value of the system is limited.

Color Tables and Charts

Color tables expand the color bar, literally and figuratively. They offer a similarly recognizable display of information, but one that suggests interior relationships through size, shape, or placement of the colored areas.

Richard Waller’s Basic Chart

Richard Waller’s, 1686

Noting the lack of a standard for colors in natural philosophy, and inspired by a similar table published in Stockholm, Richard Waller indicated that his “Table of Physiological Colors Both Mixt and Simple,” (created in 1686) would permit unambiguous descriptions of the colors of natural bodies. To describe a plant, for example, one could compare it to the chart and use the names found there to identify the colors of the bark, wood, leaves, etc. Similar applications of the information collected in the chart might also extend to the arts and trades, he suggested.

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This is the first post in a series on English Color Etymologies. Today we are looking at the colors that come from the names of animals, insects, and flowers, trees and plants.

English is a colorful language. Since its birth among the tribes of Europe, English has built its color vocabulary with the wealth of words it has inherited from Anglo-Saxon, Norman French, Latin, and Greek. Collected here are 172 colors that standard dictionaries (I used the American Heritage and the Random House) classify as specific color nouns (these do not, of course, include the standard ten – red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple, brown, black, grey, white – or any Crayola inventions). This treasure of colors is broken down by etymological origin: is the color the name of a flower, an animal, or even a historical person? Some colors appear twice (when I felt two origins were sufficiently different). Others appear only once though they could certainly fit into several categories.

Ever wonder how a color got its name? Refer to the following and enjoy your new grasp on color!

ANIMALS

Photo by fortphoto

The plumage, pelts, tusks, shells, and scales of various animals have all lent their names to colors.

Elephant tusk (made of the same material as all mammalian teeth).	Covering of a bird’s or reptile’s egg, made of calcium.
Soft leather, particularly from buffalo, elk, or oxen.	A game fish.
A large wading bird.	Rocklike structure formed of the calcareous skeletons of various, small sea creatures.
A small finch native to the Canary Islands (“the island of dogs”).	A small freshwater duck.
A young deer.	A European goat antelope.
A French mole (word now obsolete for reference to the animal).	A small, forest-dwelling, carnivorous mammal, related to the martens.
Italian word for the cuttlefish (and the ink it secretes).

INSECTS

Photo by markop

Various insects have been used for dyeing fabric over time and have thus become their own color.


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Color in photography has come a long way since the first permanent color photo was taking in 1861. Now nearly 150 years later we thought we would take a look and see where and how color developed in photography. Starting with the black and white beginnings.

Monochrome Photography

Monochrome photography implies the act of recording light in a single color or wavelength and includes such types of photographs as black and white, sepia, infrared photography, and X-ray photography.

Oldest surviving photo created in 1826 by inventor Nicéphore Niépce

Black and White
Black and white photography uses neutral tones of gray ranging from near white to near black, or using a grayscale.

Photo by whappen

Photography began with the discovery that silver is a light sensitive chemical. Silver halides, or silver salt compounds, break down when exposed to light and form black metallic silver2. The darker areas of a negative that received more light during exposure block the light that would reach photographic paper during printing, thus allowing the paper to remain whiter in relation to the local negative density. The lighter areas of the negative that received less light during exposure allow more light to pass during printing, darkening those areas of the print.
- wikipedia:Monochrome_Photography

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Sorting through the incredible number of wood varieties is a task of enormous proportions, and one we didn’t even think of taking on. Lucky for us there are people who are doing just that.

Exotic Wood Pictures: Exotic Wood Displayed, described, and Identified is “a non-commercial site focusing on color-correct pictures of exotic and domestic woods.” The site, which I found while performing the always necessary first step in any research, a Google search, is wonderful for exploring the amazing colors of the different varieties of wood. The highlighted statistics for the site read:

# different types of wood represented: 685
# unique pictures of those woods: 17,722

For any hard core wood fan out there this a great site to sort through hundreds of options for any upcoming wood related projects you might have on the table, or in the COLOURlovers case, this site can offer inspiration from the unique colors that make up each type.

Below we have assembled a few inspirational palettes with their corresponding types from some of the 685 wood varieties represented on the site. Plus, a few images of the incredible colors of petrified wood.

Wood Color Inspiration

• Angico
• Guearu
• Bosse
• Cinnamon
• Caretto

• Oak, Bog
• Bishop Wood
• Briar
• Podo
• Zircote

• Cocuswood
• Blackbean
• Beech
• Makai
• Buckthorn

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Pantone was founded in 1962 as a small business that manufactured color cards for cosmetics companies. Since their humble beginning, Pantone has become a mainstay for color in the design world. The Pantone Matching System allows colors to be “matched” when they reach the production stages. They also assert that their lists of color numbers and pigment values are the intellectual property of Pantone and free use of the list is not allowed, which is controversial and could be said to cause problems, especially for open source uses. Controversy aside, the world leader in color hasn’t stopped with just their matching system and has started to move into taking over the ‘universe’ of color as well with the launch of Pantone Universe.

Pantone Universe, Pantone’s consumer product extension, “comes in color to match your personal taste and express your inner emotions.” And since here at COLOURlovers we like our things to be, well, colorful, and since the Pantone Universe site is not that user friendly, we have put together a guide to some of their products.

This guide was inspired by the guide posted over at the wonderful blog, ‘If it’s hip, It’s Here.’

Pantone, and their off shoot of products has been a frequent subject here at COLOURlovers and we have previously covered some of the phones, bags, coffee mugs and art that make up the Pantone Universe, plus a fun post about Pantone Colors Found in Real Life.

Office

Stationary

Notebooks, file folders and business card holders available here.

USB Drives

“Express your personality and store your creations in style. These durable, aluminum design thumb drives allow you to store your digital photos, music files, business documents, and more on an ultra-small Hi-speed USB flash drive. Available in 14 PANTONE Colors.” Shop USB Drives.

Coming Soon

Coming soon from Pantone will be a line of basic office supplies like twin markers, colored pencils, staplers, and scissors.


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Even if you haven’t yet been able to travel as your wildest dreams may desire, put these locations on your list of places to see in life. I hope you enjoy the pictures in our color-centric version of the series, and we regret it can’t contain every one of the world’s gorgeous locations. If you want even more, Read the book of 1,000 Places to See Before You Die or visit the Flickr 1,000 Places Group.

Here Are 19 of Those Places…

by Christopher Chan
The Pyramids of Giza, Egypt

by Jeff Epp
Cherry Blossom Viewing, Japan

by Geff Rossi
Notre-Dame Basilica, Quebec, Canada

by Becky E
Ayers Rock and the Olgas, Australia

by il Presbite
Siena, Italy

by nadi0
The Great Ocean Road, Australia

by Barrosopal
Palacio de Cristal, Retiro Park, Madrid

by Christopher Chan
Golden Gate Bridge, San Francisco


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Color has always been an important component of fashion whether it be a heather grey or crimson red. Each designer makes color choices that will be indicative of their aesthetic, season, and era. Lately, I’ve been seeing beautiful and rich color choices in the fashion and accessory world. It seems that everyone is becoming obsessed with Pantone gradations. Check out some of my favorite examples of some stunningly colorful products as well as Pantone’s Spring color predictions.

Softbank Cell Phones

SoftBank Cell Phones in glossy bright colors via Geeksugar

Kate Spade



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There is hardly a better way to symbolize a social or political movement than with color. Many historical movements can be easily identified with a single image or flag that, more often than not, strongly involves color. So it is appropriate that one of the brightest social movements is symbolized by the rainbow.

The LGBT movement was first symbolized by the pink triangle, which was originally used as a stigma by the Nazis to identify homosexuals in concentration camps, and it wasn’t until 1978 that Gilbert Baker designed what is now known as the symbol for the LGBT movement, The Rainbow Flag.

The Rainbow Flag

Fuscia - Sexuality
Red - Life
Orange - Healing
Yellow - Sunlight
Green - Nature
Turquoise - Magic
Blue - Serenity
Violet - Spirit



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