Finding a reasonable Color Coding System

PROBLEMS:

• We have 6 primary Colors, but 7 named notes.
• those notes are not evenly spaced. E-F and B-C are closer
• Our human perception favors certain color ranges and is less capable to distinguish others (Example: Red-Yellow vs Red-Magenta, we see a lot less difference in the red-magenta-range)

A word on "primary colors"

Yes, you probably learned in primary school (oh, pun!) that "red, yellow and blue are THE PRIMARIES. Because we can mix all the others colors with just those!"

But, NOOOOOOOO, this is wrong!!!!!!!!! wrong!

It's almost close, though. The primary colors for pigments are Magenta, Yellow and Cyan. The primaries for light are Red, Blue and Green. And all of them combine to a full color wheel with 6 equal primaries. If you want to learn more about this: here (long) and here (short)

Version 1: Primary Colors on Primary Notes

I started with with just putting the primary colors on every named note. As a 7th color orange was the most logical choice. We have a very distinguished perception between yellow, orange and red. And since B is very close to C it also fits in a musical sense.

When it comes to E and F it does not work extremely well. Yes, both are "bluish" hues, but they have a very harsh difference in dark-to-light to our human vision.

As soon as the sharps and flats are added it works even less well: F#, G and G# are barely different for humans (fun fact: people with red-green blindness are better at distinguishing that range).

Use this when you don't need sharps and flats.

Version 2: Compromise with Cyan centered on F#

Moving cyan to F# has some benefits

• we need less greenish tones
• we smooth the step from Blue to Cyan
• we have cyan centered and "opposite" to C/red

However the downside is, that the primary color Cyan is no longer included in the basic notes.

The steps from E to G and A to C even work in the same way:

• E-F-F#-G: mixed blue to green in: 0%-33%-50%-100%. Since blue and green are two steps apart we get the primary cyan at 50%.
• A-A#-B-C: mixed yellow to red in: 0%-25%-50%-100%. Since yellow and red are one step apart we get the secondary orange at 50%.

G# and F are not at the 50% position between their neighbors to increase readability.

Use this when you need the full scale of values