this post was submitted on 15 Jul 2023
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Explain Like I'm Five

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How do computers make any color using red/green/blue, when paints make every clor using red/yellow/blue?o (wirebase.org)
submitted 1 year ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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Im always confused by RGB. I learned that if you want orange, you mix red and yellow. If you want green, you mix blue and yellow, if you want purple, you mix red and blue.

How is it that computers need green and not yellow?

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

Basically there are two color models, additive and substractive. RGB is additive - turning on red it triggers the red receptors in the eye. If you turn on all three it triggers all your color receptors and you'll see white. That is all the visible spectrum, if you look at the Sun (which you shouldn't) you perceive it as white even if the maximum of the emission is at green.

When mixing paint (subtractive model, like CMYK on printers) if you mix all colors, they absorb different part of the light and don't reflect anything visible for you, and you'll see black(ish)