Chroma
Explore how light and color combine
Explore color relationships by moving circles, adding RGB light or overlapping ideal subtractive filters. Sample a point to compare the resulting display color, or explore optional musical mappings of colors and circles.
Key idea
Adding light and filtering light are different operations. Red plus green makes yellow in additive RGB; an ideal cyan filter removes red from white light. The background and the mixing rule matter as much as the circle’s color.
Try this first
Start with red, green and blue circles in Add light. Drag them until two overlap, then bring all three together. Compare cyan, magenta, yellow and white in the overlapping regions before changing one circle’s intensity.
How to get started
- Choose Add light for colored light on black, or Subtract light for ideal filters on white. Switching modes keeps your circles; Reset starts the RGB or CMY example for that mode.
- Tap a colored dot to add a circle. Drag circles to move them; arrow keys move the focused circle and Shift makes finer adjustments.
- Select a circle to change its color, intensity or size in settings. Hide it temporarily or remove it; up to ten circles can be mixed.
- Activate the color probe and move its crosshair, or tap the canvas, to inspect a color. Tap its hex value to copy. Export saves a PNG without control overlays; workspace changes save automatically.
- Tap Sound to start. Color plays three tones weighted by the probe’s RGB values; Circles maps hue to pitch, position to stereo pan and intensity to level. Choose notes and volume in settings. This is artistic sonification, not the physical sound of light.
Explore a little further
Try another experiment
In Subtract light, reset to the cyan, magenta and yellow example. Overlap cyan and yellow and inspect the green result with the probe. Add magenta to the overlap, then compare with the white overlap of RGB lights in Add light.
Good to know
Chroma uses ideal display-RGB arithmetic. Add light sums color channels; Subtract light multiplies filter transmission on white. Real pigments, spectral filters, displays and vision are more complex. The probe models the scene color, not selection outlines or screen calibration. Optional sound maps these RGB values or individual circles to musical tones; this is artistic sonification, not the physical sound of light.
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