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In the last lesson,

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we learned about simultaneous contrast and color illusion.

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In this lesson, we'll learn about the illusion of transparency and color mixing.

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So again, using our colorated papers,

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we're going to try to create the illusion of transparency

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with two ground colors and a color that looks like the mixture of those two colors.

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Again, we're thinking about what Albers says,

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find the middle color.

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So I'll start with a light color and again a darker color and I'm just using grays here to simplify.

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I'm going to put them into an organization like this where they seem to be overlapping.

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Now I'm going to choose a middle color and literally

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looking at the range of colors I have and trying to find something that exists

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in the middle, in between these two colors.

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In this case, just in value.

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Looks pretty good.

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And I'll cut a little triangle off the corner.

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And when I place this on top,

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and I put these pieces in this proximity,

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we create this color illusion where this color looks like

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it's basically what we're seeing as seeing through this piece into this piece or seeing through this piece onto this piece.

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That this is the middle color.

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Creating the illusion of transparency.

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Just with value.

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Now keep in mind that these are perfectly opaque colors.

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There's no actual transparency here, no physical transparency.

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This is a solid piece of paper, solid color.

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So it truly is an illusion.

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We're being tricked into thinking that these colors are transparent.

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Albers says,

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I'm paraphrasing here,

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but he asked us to basically mix colors with our eyes closed.

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To try to use our imagination to think of a color that would be a middle color in between and go find that color.

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I'm going to try one more thing while I still have these colors here.

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Right now, some of you may think that this gray rectangle is overlapping the darker gray rectangle.

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Or some of you might think that the darker gray is overlapping this.

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So I'm going to try to make it more specific.

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I'm going to try to make the gray rectangle look like it's overlapping the lighter gray rectangle.

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I'm going to do that by cutting another piece of a darker gray and see what happens.

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So again, this is where we started.

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And the transparency effect is clear,

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but it's maybe unclear as to where exactly the layers are.

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But as soon as I put this piece on,

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now it looks like this is overlapping that for most of us,

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the darker color.

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Because I've shifted this middle color toward the darker side.

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Now let's try the same experiment using color,

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in this case, blue and blue-green.

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So I've got a range of beautiful blues here.

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And ColorAid is so rich.

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These colors are just amazing to look at.

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Even if you never cut them up.

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I have a lot of students who don't want to cut up their ColorAid because it's so beautiful.

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So I'll choose a dark round.

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Say this one, nice and blue.

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And I'll choose a light ground.

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Maybe this one.

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And we'll do the same experiment.

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I'll look for a middle color.

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Something that lies in the middle.

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That's a good middle color.

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I'll cut a triangle of that.

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I might have to change my juxtaposition here.

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Here we go.

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A little bit different juxtaposition.

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So there the color effect is different now.

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Still, we're creating that illusion of transparency.

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My guess is that most of you are seeing this light blue rectangle

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overlapping the darker blue rectangle.

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But maybe not.

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Maybe some of you are seeing the opposite.

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It all has to do with this triangle, though.

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This triangle,

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which we think of as the child

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of these two colors.

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These are the parents.

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This is the child.

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It's affecting how the

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space illusion relationship between these background shapes works.

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This color either emerges or recedes.

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You think back to Albers again,

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his Homage to the Square,

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which is all about receding and emerging colors.

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Well, that's what's happening here.

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The lesson that is to be learned here from this experiment is how to control colors to create

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that sensation of emerging and receding.

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And in that way,

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you create visual hierarchy.

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Look here first.

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Look here second.

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Look what's happening to this color.

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It's emerging.

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Look what happens to that color.

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It recedes.

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Let's just see what happens if I shift these colors away from the

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blue now toward a blue-green.

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I'll keep this dark blue background and I will choose a blue-green.

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Very different.

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This was my original blue.

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Now I'm going toward a greener blue.

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Again, I'm going to look for that middle color,

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something that exists in between these two.

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This is pretty good in terms of a middle color.

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That's also very good.

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Let's just try this one.

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It's so vivid.

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Again, so we produce a certain kind of effect by doing this.

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Kind of an illusion there.

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Again, you're like mixing colors with closed eyes,

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right?

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You're mixing colors in your imagination,

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trying to find the color that's going to best represent

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this idea.

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So that, I think, is a little bit too vivid.

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So I'm going to try one more color that's

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a little bit less vivid.

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This is a very vivid color,

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and it might be getting in the way of the illusion of transparency.

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So I'll try a color that's very similar to this

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in value, but a little bit different in terms of saturation.

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A little bit less saturated.

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Also not quite right.

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A little bit too yellow.

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I think the other one was better.

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Let's see what happens with this.

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So much of this is trial and error,

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right?

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Just trying things out.

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Again, looking for that overlap,

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that illusion of transparency.

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It's actually kind of nice.

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So this is what we call color theory.

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We're working in a perfectly experimental situation.

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We're trying things out.

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We're trying to do things using trial and error,

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strictly as our operating principle.

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Working with different kinds of colors

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to get different results.

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Seeing how colors can seem to emerge and recede based on this idea.

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That's back to my original.

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Kind of beautiful.

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So we've seen a pretty good example here of how we can use colorated paper to create the illusion of transparency,

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and to some degree, space illusion.

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Now we're going to move on to the computer and do the same exercises there,

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and try to actually exaggerate that idea of spatial illusion.