Most of the time when artists talk about the color wheel they are usually referring to the traditional color wheel (seen to the right, click to enlarge image) that is made from pigments and paint. This is the color wheel most people learn in elementary school and the primary colors are Red, Yellow and Blue. These are mixed together to create all the other colors. This color wheel was invented by Johannes Iten, a Swiss color and art theorist.

Traditional, pigment color is also referred to as subtractive color, where you add the primary colors together and you get black. Items here have no color of their own, the way we see them is made of reflected light.

To help understand the difference between the two color systems, subtractive and additive, the way we see an apple is a good example of subtractive color. We see the color of a red apple because that color is bounced off the surface and into our eyes, where the rest of the light spectrum is absorbed by the object. It is called subtractive because the whole of the light spectrum is absorbed by the object except for the color we actually see. The other colors are subtracted from the whole. In contrast, additive color occurs when colors are added together to create a color that we see. The light is generated and projected, not reflected. Learn more about the additive color system which is best used for digital media in our next tutorial: the Digital color wheel.

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