I’ve stumbled across a real gem the other day. In researching 2 and 3 strip film processing techniques, color spaces, and projection systems (yes nerdy I know…), I came across a link to the Widescreen Museum Old Color page, which offers an incredibly interesting technical overview of old film color techniques like Technicolor, Cinecolor etc. If you are at all interested in how these films get their unique look, curious about reverse engineering a specific look, or simply enjoy a taste of cinema history, be sure to check it out, as there is an exhaustive amount of information contained in this site.

DVXUser has a concise, easy to understand explanation of colour sampling methods in digital video, with diagrams!

You’ve seen the numbers: 4:2:0, 4:4:4, 3:1:1, 3:1.5:1.5, 4:1:1, 4:2:2… What does it all mean? And how does it affect your video? What’s better, what’s worse, and when does it matter?

What those numbers are referring to is a technique in digital video commonly called “color sampling.” The concept can be a bit confusing to those not used to working with video in the digital domain. In video, it’s common practice to not actually record all the color in an image, but rather to average the pixels together to cut down on the bandwidth. Color sampling is, in effect, a form of compression. The more compressed the engineers can make the color channel, the less bandwidth the signal occupies and the easier it is to record, transmit, or broadcast.

Full article, via DVGuru

Adobe Labs keeps pumping out wonderfulness on a weekly basis. The latest treat is called kuler, an online color theme app. You’ve seen plenty of these before if you do any Web work, but this is different. First, the interface is absolutely gorgeous and intuitive; even if you’re as color-clueless as I am, you’ll love exploring different color themes. Second, it’s built entirely in Flash, making it far more dynamic. Third, and most importantly, you can share the color themes you create. Navigate by popularity, rating, or tag, then open a color theme and edit it yourself, or publish your own. When you’ve found one you like, you can export to Adobe CS2 apps (or just make a note of the color values, of course).

Check it out. Flash 9 is required (and if you don’t have it yet, it’s time — it’s out of beta).

kuler [Adobe Labs]

I’m always looking for color inspiration for my visuals and designs, so I’ll be back.

Working with visuals means working with color, and if you spend a lot of time coding visuals in tools like Flash/ActionScript and Processing, keeping track of color and different color codes becomes even more vital. One of the first tools Mac users miss on Windows is the color palette. But I’ve become addicted to a tool that’s so handy, I miss it when I’m on my Macs:

Iconico ColorPic

ColorPic provides all the basic color picker options, with different available color mixers, HSV/RGB value readouts, and numeric and hex values. Where it excels, though, is in a powerful color picker with a magnification and grid option, and the ability to save palettes of chips. The grabber is especially customizable and makes finding exact pixel values unusually easy, and the whole palette floats on top of all windows. This free utility is better than some shareware options I’ve used. It’s definitely on my “top 10 list” for the first Windows utilities I’ll install.

Got a favorite utility for visual work, on Windows, Mac, or Linux? Let us know.

Could that Maxlite at your side be a musical instrument in disguise? With up to 9 audience participants, viewers of the RGB project can control sound and visuals using colored flashlights, in a performance installation by Tomas Dvorak (CZ), Alessandro Capozzo (IT) and Matous Godik (CZ). The team used the free PC-only software EyesWeb, passing data to Macs running Max/MSP for sound and Processing for visuals. If you wanted to do something like this, EyesWeb would be a good place to start; it can track the movement of specified color(s) through a live video signal. There are other options, too; watch for an upcoming how-to on camera input in a print story by me (can’t say where yet, but I’ll let you know when I can).

RGB project site with description, visuals, and video; via our friend Chris “Pixelsumo”

Spencer Kiser, another whiz kid from NYU’s ITP program, gives CDM our first look at his SpinCycle. It’s a new take on the turntable: instead of tracking grooves on a disc, the device reads colors and produces sounds (and hypnotic colors). Check out Spencer’s flickr gallery for pics for now, but he promises more documentation and video soon.

Another reason I’m jealous of Spencer: he made the Vancouver conference on new musical instrument interfaces. Check out what looks like an interactive washboard-computer interface! More on all this soon . . .