Colour Profiling

There is no current blood test or scientific method to accurately measure and classify the biological colour of a person’s skin, hair and eye pigmentation.

There is also no current schema to accurately determine the colours and tones which harmonise with a person’s skin, hair and eyes.

Lle Thomas – The Brock Elbank Foundation

The genetic pigmentation of human skin, hair and eyes – colour characteristics – interact dynamically to define a person’s colour expression.

Colour expression

colorDNA describes a person’s look as their colour expression. This is an abstract term used to describe a person’s colour characteristics and the active relationship between the skin, hair and eyes.

A person’s colour expression title is determined by the colour qualities which dominate the colour characteristics.

The colour expression title may not include all of the unique colour qualities present in a person’s skin, hair and eyes.

This woman has moderate to high tone contrast, low hue and variable saturation contrast, with strong clear, red orange colouring

Colour expression is a dynamic human colour identification, which is most vibrant before aging and the loss of natural proteins and pigmentation begins.

The skin pigmentation at this age is vibrant and healthy

The peak time of vibrancy is different fr everyone and increases or decreases with the combined effects of health and lifestyle.

A healthy lifestyle prolongs the loss of vital proteins and pigmentation, and maintains youthful vibrancy in the skin and hair

Using science

To scientifically profile human colouring, a number of challenges need to be overcome.

There must be a range of three-dimensional colours and tones large enough to include the diversity of all human skin, hair and eye colours.

This blue eye colour palette is one of many blue shades used to classify blue eyes

There must also be a process by which the colour qualities of each colour characteristic can be separated, identified and classified, individually and as a combination.

The process must be able to analyse and classify people as they age

Human colouring is not definitive; it is organic, biologically alive and in a constant state of change due to a person’s health, the aging process and individual lifestyle choices. 

Therefore, the colour system requires an algorithm and artificial intelligence to organically follow people as they change.

A human colour classification method must be based on the same colour principles which are used worldwide by artists, designers, education and business to classify, identify and match colour.

Colour principles

These colour principles include the colour wheel first created by Sir Isaac Newton.

colorDNA uses the 12-step colour wheel to identify the colour categories into which a person’s skin, hair and eyes are classified. The colours are referred to in the colorDNA system as hues.

12-step colour wheel

From Professor Albert Munsell’s colour system, the colour identifiers of value and chroma are used.

Three-dimensional representation of Munsell ‘s colour sphere

Value is referred to in the colorDNA system as tone. It identifies lightness through to darkness of each colour characteristic.

Value and tone scale

Chroma is referred to as variable saturation. This term identifies the level of dullness to vitality of the skin, hair and eyes and also describes the level of saturation and evenness across each colour characteristic.

Blue chroma scale

In addition to the colour wheel, value and chroma, Johannes Itten’s methods of identifying and classifying contrast are the fourth identifier used by the colorDNA system to classify human colour expression.

The contrast of hue, chroma and value are all evident in the artwork titled Summer by Johannes Itten

Contrast recognises the different levels of juxtaposed hue, tone and variable saturation within a person’s skin, hair and eyes.

The high contrast between the hue, tone and variable saturation in Frida Kahlo’s self-portrait is compelling

The three colour elements of hue, value and chroma, now referred to in the colorDNA system as hue, tone and variable saturation, plus contrast are known within the colorDNA system of human colouring as colour qualities.

Colour qualities

The three colorDNA qualities from each of the skin, hair and eyes are separated, analysed and classified.

The hue, tone and variable saturation of a person's hair is analysed and classified

The classification method is achieved by a sophisticated structure of principles, algorithms and scientifically controlled three-dimensional colour palettes.

The hue, tone and variable saturation of a person’s eyes are analysed and classified

The colour qualities create a person’s colour expression. 

The hue, tone and variable saturation of a person's skin is analysed and classified

They personalise human colour palettes and identify which reflecting colours, tones and contrasts create harmony and which create discord.

The colour qualities of this woman’s colour characteristics, including the light, shade and her make-up, combine with the texture, value and hues of what she is wearing to create a wonderful, harmonising look

Like all colorDNA theory, the process to determine a person’s colour characteristic qualities is set up for every human colour combination, young and old.

This man’s colour expression is very different to what it was before the aging process began

The majority of the world’s population is found across Asia and Africa, and over many generations each race of people who live in a local area have developed the same or similar colour characteristic qualities.

The local people of Pyongyang, North Korea

Human colour characteristic variations, beyond Asia and Africa – lighter coloured hair and eyes – have, for the most part, stemmed from central and northern Europe.

A team of researchers from Copenhagen University believe a single mutation approximately 8,000 years ago is responsible for all the blue-eyed people on earth today

Through migration and the development of the Western world, and the evolution of so many different ethnicities, natural selection has created a world population filled with every human colour combination imaginable.

However, the majority of the world’s population and colouring remains through Asia and Africa. 

World Population Density (people/km2) – courtesy of Junuxx

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