Concept · Foundations

How the Eye Sees Color

Color vision starts with three kinds of cone cell in the retina, most sensitive to short, medium or long wavelengths; nerve cells, beginning in the retina itself, then compare their signals.

The three ranges overlap widely, so no single cone signals red or blue; color comes from the balance among them. That is why three lights can be mixed to match a huge range of colors.

• Watch a garden at dusk: as cones give way to the more sensitive rods, colors fade before shapes do.
• Color is seen most sharply at the center of gaze, where cones are packed most densely.
• The eye's lens yellows with age, absorbing more of the shortest, blue-violet wavelengths before they reach the cones.

Retina

The light-sensitive layer lining the back of the eye.

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