Notes

What can we learn from these samples?

In the examples shown, you’ll notice that the purple neps on the yellow background look less saturated than the purple base fiber, even though the two are the same color. The yellow neps, which are close to a pure yellow, visually pop more against the purple.

The light blue neps appear even lighter in color when viewed against the dark blue background. However, the dark blue neps also look lighter than the dark blue base fiber. They do not visually pop in the way the yellow neps do, creating an almost opposite effect.

Finally, the orange neps on the pink background appear more yellow than the orange base fiber. The pink neps appear to lean more toward a warmer pink than than pink base fiber. Again, all of these colors were dyed to match, so there is no true difference between the pink neps and pink base fiber or the purple neps and base fiber. But our eyes read them as slightly different colors!

Why Does This Happen?

The back of your eye is lined with light- and color-sensitive cone cells. The cones can interact in complex ways which can fool your eye. For example, when cones in one part of your eye see blue light, they make nearby cones less sensitive to blue. Therefore, if you see a light blue dot on a dark blue background, the dot will appear less blue than it otherwise would. Likewise, an orange dot against a hot pink background will make the background appear less pink, leaning more toward the yellow than would look as a solid color. In the case of our purple and yellow, our yellow is a primary color which lacks blue and red pigment. That blue and red is contained within the purple, on the opposite side of the color wheel. Because there is no overlap in the colors in a complementary color scheme, our eyes view these colors as high contrast, unlike our other samples.

Apply This Concept

The next time you spin for a sweater or another large project, consider sampling in this way as you explore colors for your project. While we used neps in this tutorial to create our color shifts, try using a speckle-dyed roving or a smooth batt with different colors incorporated. Recycled sari silk or other add-ins can also create this color-shifting illusion. A color that looks too bright to you can be neutralized by pairing it with the right color. Or if bright colors are your happy place, choosing the right pairing can make your colors pop more! Our eyes lie to us all the time. Let’s use that to our advantage!

Resources

Albers, J., & Weber, N. F. Interaction of Color. Yale University Press, 2013.

Gurney, J. Color and Light: A Guide for the Realist Painter. Andrews McMeel Publishing, 2010.