Color Mixing

Color Mixing

Color Mixing
Reading Level

	edHelper's suggested reading level:	grades 7 to 8
	Flesch-Kincaid grade level:	7.02

Vocabulary

	challenging words:		Quiltmakers, Yellow-orange, neon, subtraction, in-between, colored, indigo, primary, suspect, secondary, neutral, beginning, scientist, natural, ordinary, produce
	content words:		Big Bird, Sponge Bob

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Color Mixing
By Sharon Fabian

¹     Did you ever wonder how paints or crayons make all of those different colors when you paint or draw? If you're thinking like a scientist, you may already suspect that it has something to do with light. The ordinary white light that we see every day is really made up of a whole rainbow of colors. All of the rainbow colors, -- red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet -- and all of the shades in between, are contained in ordinary sunlight. All of them mixed together make the light that we see by, which is usually called white light.

²     The next thing that you need to know is that most objects absorb some colors of light. An object that is blue absorbs all other colors except blue, and reflects only the blue. That is why a blue car, a blue notebook, and blue jeans look blue. They reflect only the blue light. A yellow school bus absorbs all of the colors except yellow, and reflects only yellow. Big Bird and Sponge Bob reflect yellow light too.

³     It works the same way with paint and other art materials. Red paint absorbs all colors of light except red, and reflects only red. You could say that it subtracts out all of the other colors and leaves only red. That's why using paint, crayons, colored pencils, or markers is called color subtraction.

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