Colour and their influences on perception

And have you ever disagreed with a friend, family member or colleague about the colour of an object or clothing item? If so, you’ve experienced how subjective colour can be.

There’s a complex science behind color perception, and multiple factors that impact how we see. At the very least, these differences can cause friendly disagreements. However, if accurate, consistent product colours are a critical part of your company’s success, not accounting for these differences can be a costly mistake.

Laurie Pressman, vice president of the Pantone Color Institute stated that; “While the human eye can see anywhere between eight to 10 million colors, we all see color differently. Light receptors within the eye transmit messages to the brain, which produces the familiar sensations of color.”

To add further complexity, there is a phenomenon called metamerism that can occur when two colours appear to match under one lighting condition, but not when the light changes. There are many reasons why we can view colour differently, from age to mood, focus to perception, temperature and the light source.

At PolyBlend, we are passionate about colour and have invested in this very area for many years by standardising the colour inspection process, from controlled light sources to colour management equipment and training.

As Datacolor is a global leader in colour management and technology solutions, we chose to use their spectrophotometry equipment, and colour control and analysis software. As a best practice, all of our quality control and development technicians are trained to an advanced level by datacolor experts in colour technology and management.

Add these complexities of colour to the sheer variation across plastic material finishes and it is head-spinning: opaque, transparent, matte, high gloss, textured, fluorescent and so on. Polyblend are the market leaders in coloured plastisols – ensuring colour consistency, high standards and confidence in reproducible supply, you can be assured you’re in expert hands.

If your ready to talk colour or need more information on our colour technology, please get in touch.