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Show HN: Simple algorithm and color space to generate diverse skin tones

615 points · 99 comments · automatoney

  1. s1mon · · focus · HN ↗
    It's always entertaining to try to understand these things from first principles. Color and skin color in particular are very complex things to measure and model. It's not just a physical quantity, it's also a matter of human perception based on lighting and a host of factors.

    It seems like some work was done to research existing approaches, but I don't see any reference to Pantone Skin Tones [0]. Without intending to, I've worked on 3 different projects which involved measuring skin tones for makeup applications. The Pantone range is not 100% perfect, but it's pretty well done and easy to understand. There are two axes: a light/dark one, and red-yellow one [1].

    [0] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.pantone.com&#x2F;na&#x2F;en-us&#x2F;skintone" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.pantone.com&#x2F;na&#x2F;en-us&#x2F;skintone

    [1] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;cosmeticsbusiness.com&#x2F;pantone-skintone-guide-80945" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;cosmeticsbusiness.com&#x2F;pantone-skintone-guide-80945

    1. zild3d · · focus · HN ↗
      well its not a free as in beer color space
      1. itishappy · · focus · HN ↗
        Pantone is not a color space. They are a supplier of physical color samples. Most pigments can be represented in a color space, but that representation differs based on illumination so it not unique. Some Pantone pigments, fluorescent colors in particular, cannot be represented by a color space at all!
        1. tialaramex · · focus · HN ↗
          Yup. This is a rabbit hole like time. Learn a little bit about it, know there&#x27;s a staggering amount more and then any time you actually need it, check that you&#x27;ve agreed on as much detail as you needed for the task and not less.

          The person inviting you to a picnic &quot;next week&quot; might need to know about Time Zones if they live some distance away. The requirement to update the CSS on the web site to match a new company logo might need to know about Colour Spaces. But that picnic invite doesn&#x27;t care about Calendar systems or Leap Seconds, and the logo mandate doesn&#x27;t care about Sub-surface scattering or a Quantum theory of light.

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