Colorwriting Machine

Wow, this is so cool!

Tyree Callahan converted a 1937 Underwood Standard typewriter into a colorwriter. He replaced the ink pads and letter keys by colored paint pads and markers. So that you can 'write' color instead of text. I love the idea...

You can go vote for this work of art here.

Red Faces over Yellow Bridge

Oops. 

A bridge that should have been painted blue was accidentally painted yellow. The people of Upton-upon-Severn, a town in England were quite upset to find that the muted Dutchess Blue that was chosen in a six week public consultation had been replaced by a bright yellow. 

Never underestimate the public outrage when picking the color wrong. 

Can You Recognize Coca-Cola Red?

You probably know as well as I do that Coca-Cola Inc. goes to great lengths to have the exact same shade of red on every can and bottle of coke in every corner of the world. So, one would expect to be able to recognize Coca-Cola red, right? Else, why go through all the trouble? Here's a test. Can you recognize Coca-Cola red in the 3 images below? All images, including the photo of the can, were meticulously color calibrated.

Please take the poll to vote for the most likely contender. After you take the poll you can visit this page to see which image is actually Coca-Cola red.

Poll: Which has CocaCola red?

• image 1
• image 2
• image 3

Result:

Nasa Produces Nano Black

This week, NASA announced that they managed to produce real black black paint. The image shows the structure of the nano paint under a microscope.

What is black? There was an interesting discussion on Quora, the other day, about black. Go check it out, some interesting things came up. My own definition of black, as written on Quora, is:

"No light. The perfect black surface reflects or emits no light at all."

Which implies that black paint absorbs all light. However, the blackest of black paints only absorbs some 90% of light max. So black paint isn't actually black. It's dark grey. And then there's the invisable light: infrared and ultraviolet. They're more important than you think, because they contribute much to the heat buildup in a paint surface. It is always said that a dark surface becomes warmer than a light surface. While this may be true in most cases, it disregards the effect of UV and infrared. Some dark surfaces won't get as warm as you'd expect because they won't absorb UV and infrared.

So now Nasa came up with a black paint that absorbs up to 99.5% of all light, including infrared and UV. If you would use that paint on your house, it would become a bit of a black hole. I wouldn't recommend it. But I'd love to see it nonetheless.

Pedro Gadanho, master Colorist

Here's some work of a Portugese architect and master colorist: Pedro Gadanho. Just in case you haven't come across him yet.

The image shows a house in Torres Vedras. I particularly like the way he defines shapes and spaces by use of color. He totally gets it. Visit Design Milk for more inspiring images. 

Cute Paint Job

Here's a cute paint job in the streets of Amsterdam.

The 'box' next to the door houses telephone wires. You see them all over town. But generally they are plain grey. I guess the owner of this house didn't like the grey much...

Guggenheim Colors

I'm not sure what to make of the Guggenheim Colors by Fine Paints of Europe. It looks like a finely tuned color fandeck that may provide you with some inspiration. But what to do with 'the perfect wall colors to complement the celebrated collection of modern art', if you don't have the same walls, nor the same collection? The Guggenheim Museum, a Frank Lloyd Wright masterpiece, is a very specific space, with very specific light and shape. There's just no way that the same colors will yield the same result in your living room.

Yet, if you cut through the smoke and mirrors, this may be a nice tool for inspiration. Just don't expect these colors to do exactly the same for you as they did for the Guggenheim.