Brightness-variation
Vary the brightness of a starting colour!
The brightness variation is not only suited to finding additions with the goal of a harmonic composition, but it is also suited to finding other (brighter or darker) variations of the selfsame basic statement. Playing with the diverse brightness’s reminds of light and shadow, compared to the other harmony variations (Complimentary colour contrast, Saturation contrast) it has a much greater ease to it.
Brightness variation is also referred to as “brightness contrast” in the literature. We preferred the term “variation” as the results are not contrasting, but rather next to each other, like variations of the same thing.
First the program calculates the ideal brightness variation to a colour tone, which merely varies the brightness according to the specified measure when the primary colour tone and degree of saturation (H and C in the CIELAB model) stay the same. With the selection of the “real colours” the next closest colour of the appropriate colour systems are indicated along with the deviation from the ideal.
The Rossmann-Zentrale in Hannover-Großburgwedel is a successful architectural example.
Short instructions
- Select "harmony" and "Brightness variation" in the main menu.
- Select the starting colour tone and a minimum and maximum brightness within which the development should take place. Also select the desired number of brightness grades.
- The results within the chosen colour system as well as the deviation Delta E to the calculated ideal colour grade will be displayed on the right side of the window.
- You can switch between the CIELAB coordinates and the chosen colour system with the checkbox “Ideal/Real”.
- A window
will appear in “Details” in which the results are
consolidated in the concise form of an A4 page. This page can either be
printed for documentation or the text can be copied out to send the brightness
variation on via email, for example.
Notes
The program calculates the same real colour result for several brightness grades particularly when dealing with smaller colour systems. This is not a bug – it's a feature: In colour systems in which there are no brightness variations the program will not be able to find them.
As an example HKS K consists of 86 colour tones which all turn out to be very strong and none of which have different brightness grades of the same primary colour. There fore the HKS System does not lend itself to the brightness variation. HKS answered the need for a larger variations breadth with the new “HKS 3000+” fan; the HKS raster fan is also suitable for the brightness variation.
Larger, systematically produced colour systems are more suitable, for example Brillux Scala, Caparol 3D, Sikkens 3031. The RAL DESIGN system can run the brightness variation even without our software since it is defined by CIELAB coordinates, and the uniform increase of the RAL DESIGN-L-value is exactly what our program calculates.