Changing spatial contexts
PERCEIVING COLOURS:
Colour is contextual
Notice how changing the spatial context affects a perceived colour
Details:
Middle-high school and up
Time: 15 minutes
Learning Outcome: Describe how spatial context changes the perceived colour of an object
Colour Concepts: Perceived colours can change with spatial context
Materials:
Scissors
Paint sample fan deck
Instructions:
Cut out the central hole in the Viewing screen (i.e. grey rectangle) in the handout. Note: the Viewing screen should be printed on sturdy paper or cardboard. Alternatively, a 2-cm square can be cut from a 12-cm grey (or other neutral colour) rectangular cardboard.
View a coloured wall through the hole from a distance of 20-30 feet.
Write down the colour name or number in the fan deck that you think is the closest match to the wall colour. (The match will depend on the amount of light falling on your viewing screen. If no match is possible, turn or move the screen to catch more light.)
Take the fan deck to the wall and match the colour to the closest sample. Write down the colour.
Compare the two paint swatches.
Viewing screen
Questions & observations:
Are the two paint swatches the same? If not, how do they compare?
Were the results as you expected? Why?
More to explore:
Try the same exercise with other distances to the wall, and other wall colours.
Try tilting the Viewing screen. What happens to the perceived colour of the wall?
What’s going on?
By looking at an isolated area of a wall through the Viewing screen, you are changing the spatial context of your viewing conditions. Normally, the wall colour is seen in context with its surrounding colours, the illumination of the space, etc. When you view the colour on the wall through the hole in the Viewing screen, you remove those contextual factors and replace them with another one, the context of the card’s surface colour and the illumination that surrounds the isolated colour in the hole. This affects the perceived colour of the isolated area of the wall.
Try tilting the Viewing screen while viewing the spot on the wall. By allowing more light and less light fall on the Viewing screen, you change the illumination context of the colour on the isolated area of the wall. The effect is quite dramatic!
Find out more:
See videos by David Briggs:
