Aqua, cyan, aquamarine, blue-green, cyan blue, baby blue, teal, turquoise, and so on and so forth.

Some interesting facts about Aqua (Cyan):

Cyan colored tiles are often used to pave swimming pools to make the water within them seem more inviting to swim in, by making the cyan color of their water seem more intensely colored. Water in swimming pool is colored a bright tint of cyan anyway because chlorine bleach, which is cyan, is added to water in swimming pools for disinfection.

The planet Uranus is cyan because of the abundance of methane in its atmosphere.

Cyanosis is an abnormal blueness of the skin, usually a sign of poor oxygen intake. IE- the patient is “cyanotic”

Patterns

Read the full post

Often when we think of commercial design work, we imagine 3 color logos and simple illustrations… but not all commercial work is so plain. Here are 20 commercial designers who create stunningly colorful work.

Matthew Curry | Imagefed

imagefed.com

Read the full post

Over the years of the modern Olympic era we have witnessed design take a forefront in the planning and execution of the event. It has seemingly gone from a casual, low key sporting event, with each venue taking their turn hosting, into a full scale media orgy of Superbowl proportions.

Cities have good reason to want to hold one of the the world’s greatest sporting events, with the potential economy boost, infrastructure developments and revitalized international attention, but for many cities hosting the Olympic games has been not always been a great success — in 1984 Los Angeles was the only city to make a bid for the games due to the massive cost overruns during the Montreal Games.

With the enormous costs that cities face to hold the games, more energy, and money, is being focused on branding in hopes at creating a memorable and rewarding event. Host countries now reach out to the best designers, architects, and artist, to create a spectacle the world will never forget, and the one symbol that will be plastered on the streets, merchandise, and computer and television screens across the globe: the logo. And while most designs have stuck close to the blue, yellow, black, green and red of the Olympic colors, we have begun to see new colors emerge from the more recent games, including the first logo to come in multiple colors, which will be seen in 2012.

Today were taking look at the Summer Olympic logos from 1896 to 2012 London along with some noteworthy facts from each games and palette inspiration from some of the more colorful posters and logos. For more info about each year of the Olympics, click on the corresponding image.

Olympic Design

The 1896 Summer Olympics, officially known as the Games of the I Olympiad, were an international multi-sport event which was celebrated in Athens, Greece, from April 6 to April 15, 1896. It was the first Olympic Games held in the Modern era. Ancient Greece was the birthplace of the Olympic Games, consequently Athens was perceived to be an appropriate choice to stage the inaugural modern Games. It was unanimously chosen as the host city during a congress organized by Pierre de Coubertin, a French pedagogue and historian, in Paris, on June 23, 1894. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) was also established during this congress.

Read the full post

While nature tends to trump humans when it comes to color inspiration, at least in my opinion, when humans put their hands into engineering nature, like in the case of salt evaporation ponds, together, unimaginable colors can be created.

The beautiful colors in these images from Google Earth are created during the process of harvesting salt. The vivid colors, which can range from green to bright red, come from different concentrations of algae.

Salt Evaporation Ponds

Salt evaporation ponds are shallow man-made ponds designed to produce salt from sea water. The seawater is fed into large ponds and water is drawn out through natural evaporation which allows the salt to be subsequently harvested. The ponds also provide a productive resting and feeding ground for more than 70 species of waterbirds, including several endangered species. The ponds are commonly separated by levees.

Due to variable algal concentrations, vivid colors, from pale green to bright red, are created in the evaporation ponds. The color indicates the salinity of the ponds. Micro-organisms change their hues as the salinity of the pond increases. In low to mid-salinity ponds, green algae are predominant.

In middle to high salinity ponds, an algae called Dunaliella salina shifts the color to red. Millions of tiny brine shrimp create an orange cast in mid-salinity ponds. Other bacteria such as Stichococcus also contribute tints. These colors are especially interesting to airplane passengers or astronauts passing above due to their somewhat artistic formations of shape and color.

Notable salt ponds include the San Francisco Bay salt ponds in the United States, and the Dead Sea salt ponds in Israel and Jordan and Useless Loop, and Onslow, Western Australia. Abandoned salt pans are a major feature of the southwest coast of Taiwan.

Salt pans are shallow open pans used to evaporate brine for the production of salt. The pans are usually found close to the source of the salt. For example pans used in the solar evaporation of salt from sea water are usually found on the coast, whilst those used to extract salt from solution mined brine will be found near to the brine shaft. In this case extra heat is often provided by lighting fires underneath.

Read the full post

The bikini has been raising blood pressures and making people blush since its modern creation in 1946. It has gone through a few changes over the years in style; different patterns, plummeting waist lines, disappearing amounts of fabric and fluorescent fishing lure-like colors, but like most things in fashion, things tend to come full circle, and designers look for something new by looking at something old for inspiration.

To celebrate these liberating two pieces of fabric, and as a reminder of the fleeting summer days, we’re taking a look at the colorful history of the bikini, Styles from then and now, and the most famous (or infamous) bikinis known in pop culture.

The Most Famous Bikinis of All Time

Brigitte Bardot Credited with creating the bikini market in the US with her provocative role in the 1950’s film ‘And God Created Woman.’

Ursula Andress The most famous bikini scene in the history of cinema, from the 1962 James Bond Classic ‘Dr. No.’ In the scene Andress ermerges from the water wearing an off-white bikini.

S.I. Swimsuit Issue The first issue was published in 1964 and is credited with legitimizing the bikini. The popularity of the annual magazine, which features supermodels in bikinis in exotic locals, has grown steadily since its first release, peaking in 1989 with the 25th anniversary issue with Kathy Ireland. In 2005 the single issue carried $35 million in advertising.

Raquel Welch “Discover a savage world where the only law is lust!” In One Million Years BC (1966), a strange caveman adventure film, Welch is seen wearing a torn, fur-lined brown leather bikini.

Read the full post

Imagine if an artist could take millions of years to complete a single painting.

Over millions of years the natural process of water penetrating and seeping into stones, bringing with it solutions of iron and magnesium, along with other elements, leaves traces of color and forms within the stone. This, along with cracks created from pressure and channels of water, combine their lines to push up imagery of mountains and trees, creating landscapes of unmeasurable beauty.

Known under a few names, such as: scenic stone, pictorial stones, pietra paesina, marble ruiniforme, lithographic limestone, and stone Florence (there may be others too), these stones were highly prized in early modern Europe and, before that, Asia, because of the beautiful naturally created organic landscapes.

© Bill Atkins

There are three areas in particular that are known (or were known at some point in time) for these types of stones: Florence, Italy; Jasper, Oregon; and Cotham, England.

Hercules Segers

spamula.net

Artists also used these stones as a canvas adding their own hand and transforming the natural lines and shapes of the stone’s face with their own paints, like the one on top painted by Dutch painter Hercules Segers, and the other one by Johann König.


Read the full post

To keep you cool on a hot summer’s day, we give you 106 inspiring blue palettes from the COLOURlover’s library.

Also, check out a couple of our previous color inspiration posts: yellow and green.

Read the full post

In the U.S. 7% of the male population – or about 10.5 million men – and 0.4% of the female population either cannot distinguish red from green, or see red and green differently. Color blindness affects a significant amount of the population, and it is even more prevalent in more isolated populations with a smaller gene pools. It is mostly a genetic condition, though it can be caused by eye, nerve, or brain damage, or due to exposure to certain chemicals.

For those of us who see colors just fine, it is hard to imagine what those with color blindness are seeing. Luckily humans are smart and have created technology like the Color Blind Web Page Filter.

Popular Websites: As Seen by the Color Blind

The Color Blind Web Page Filter, which was used in this post to demonstrate the different types of colorblindness, allows you to view what a site looks like to people with each type of color blindness. Here are a few examples from some popular websites.

Iconic Art: As Seen by the Color Blind

Some would say we all see art in our own unique way… that would be especially true for the color blind. Here are a couple examples of some of the most iconic paintings as seen by the color blind.

Color Blindness Background

Using the filter we’ll take a look at the current most popular palette, July, and how it is seen by those with different types of color blindness.

The normal human retina contains two kinds of light cells: the rod cells (active in low light) and the cone cells (active in normal daylight). Normally, there are three kinds of cones, each containing a different pigment. The cones are activated when the pigments absorb light. The absorption spectra of the cones differ; one is maximally sensitive to short wavelengths, one to medium wavelengths, and the third to long wavelengths (their peak sensitivities are in the blue, yellowish-green, and yellow regions of the spectrum, respectively). The absorption spectra of all three systems cover much of the visible spectrum, so it is not entirely accurate to refer to them as “blue”, “green” and “red” receptors, especially because the “red” receptor actually has its peak sensitivity in the yellow. The sensitivity of normal color vision actually depends on the overlap between the absorption spectra of the three systems: different colors are recognized when the different types of cone are stimulated to different extents. Red light, for example, stimulates the long wavelength cones much more than either of the others, and reducing wavelength causes the other two cone systems to be increasingly stimulated, causing a gradual change in hue. Many of the genes involved in color vision are on the X chromosome, making color blindness more common in males than in females.

Read the full post

Part of the mollusk phylum, Nudibranchs are the shell-less relatives of the snail and are known for their garish colors. These tiny sea creatures are usually only 2cm - 6cm in length and can be found worldwide. They are able to thrive in any depth of salt water from the deepest darkest ocean floors to warm shallow water.

There are over 3,000 known species of nudibranchs, and scientist estimate that only half have been discovered so far. The creatures soft-body and short life span of 1 year make it possible for many of them to live undetected and vanish from the earth without a trace.

Photo by wildsingapore

Nudibranchs are blind, and the animal relies on smell, taste and feel to navigate their surroundings to find coral, sponges, eggs, small fish, and other nudibranchs to eat.


Read the full post

When iron meets oxygen and water a colorful process takes place that leaves the vibrant red-orange color we know as rust. Rust is the corrosion of iron caused by a chemical reaction that take place when iron is exposed to oxygen in the presence of water or moisture. The chemical reaction creates red oxides, the familiar red-orange.

Iron oxides were used in the paints of the earliest prehistoric art. It is also used in ceramics, and synthetic versions of the pigments are widely used in cosmetics.

Rust can be a humbling reminder of the passing of time and the fragility of humans and their creations, like seeing rust appear on the edges of your first bike or car, or returning to a building or home to find it has taken on a new personality, one faded from the passing years, but it also can be inspiring with its rich color that changes and compliments the colors that surround it.

Let’s have a look at some rusty palettes, colors and patterns pulled from incredible photos and the COLOURlovers library.

Photo by scottwills



Read the full post