How We See Colors, What Makes White And Black Unique

Recently the Color InstitutePantonenamed the color of the coming 2026. The shade is called “cloud dancer” and symbolizes “a fresh start”; it is as close as possible to neutral white.

The executive director of the Color Institute, Leatrice Eisman, noted that the color under the PANTONE code 11-4201 has become a symbol of a blank canvas that opens up new horizons. She emphasized that the shade means “clarity”: the surrounding reality constantly throws off focus, and Cloud Dancer embodies the idea of ​​simplification and helps to concentrate by discarding the unnecessary.

Institute Vice President Laurie Pressman added that the new color conveys a sense of respite and relief—an opportunity to take a step back.

Experts also believe that after the pandemic, the world has accelerated sharply: remote work, digital noise, excess technology. Many people are looking for themselves and trying to figure out what to do next. To do this, you need to get rid of the unnecessary and start over, like from a blank sheet of paper.

Pantone has been choosing the color of the year since 2000. In 2025 it was, for example, 17-1230 “mocha mousse”, and in 2024 – 3-1023 “peach fuzz”.

But what is color anyway, why do we see it, and how does white come about? Experts told Nauka about this.

What is color?

In physical terms, color is the way our vision interprets the spectral composition of incoming light. Light itself is an electromagnetic wave, but the human eye can detect wavelengths between about 400 and 750 nanometers. And the brain “assembles” the sensation of color based on which sensitive cells of the retina (cones) are excited.

How does white color come about?

White is not a single wavelength. It occurs when the eye receives a mixture of light of different wavelengths, which together equally excite three types of cones (sensitive to blue, green and red parts of the spectrum).

Therefore, white is a combination, not a “white wave.” In nature, this is, for example, sunlight. It contains an almost continuous spectrum, and our brain interprets it as white.

What about black?

Black is the absence of light. If the surface almost does not reflect the incident radiation, no electrical signal occurs in the cones – the brain “sees” black. Interestingly, the “blackest” material, Vantablack, actually traps almost all incident light within the nanostructures, rather than simply being “painted black.”

How do we even see color?

Humans have three types of cones that are sensitive to different wavelength ranges. Each cone produces an electrical signal, and the brain compares their relative values.

That is, we “do not measure the wavelength,” we compare three signals, and based on their combination, the brain builds a familiar sense of color. This is called trichromatic vision.

It is important that the sensitivity of the eye is not the same: maximum sensitivity falls precisely in the green-yellow region of the spectrum. Therefore, we perceive green and shades close to them brighter and “obvious” than, for example, pure violet or deep red.

What does “neutral white” mean?

From a scientific point of view,The color of white light is described by color temperature, measured in kelvins (K). This value corresponds to the radiation spectrum of a completely black body heated to a certain temperature.

At these color temperatures, the spectrum of the source is closest to the spectrum of daytime sunlight, without a noticeable shift into “warm” or “cool” shades. Its maximum, like that of solar radiation, occurs in the green-yellow region, which is why it is perceived by the eye as natural white.

Thus, when we talk about household appliances in a “neutral white” case, we intuitively strive for the same visual neutrality – a color that does not “pull” into either warm beige or cold gray, but remains a neutral background, like daylight itself.