
Show HN: Colors.lol – Overly descriptive color palettes - picdit
https://colors.lol/
======
undershirt
I can’t find the source now, but does anyone remember the collection of color
names based on real things? It felt meaningful to remember the spectrum of
colors that way (instead of arbitrary qualifiers), but now I can’t find it.

~~~
moiriad
By any Chance: Werner's Nomenclature of Colours ?

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undershirt
Finally found my notes on it, and threw this quick page on it since the
original website doesn’t seem to work:

[https://observablehq.com/@shaunlebron/meaningful-color-
names](https://observablehq.com/@shaunlebron/meaningful-color-names)

I had not heard of Werner’s, but I like the idea of colors based on animal,
floral, and mineral, thanks for the reference!

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chris_st
Awesome! You might consider using colors from Janelle's famous color names
experiment[0].

[0] [https://tmblr.co/ZP7VLs2LxVDcI](https://tmblr.co/ZP7VLs2LxVDcI) \-- part
2!

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parkersweb
I've been using this resource: [http://chir.ag/projects/name-that-
color/](http://chir.ag/projects/name-that-color/) in naming CSS colour
variables for years. It can often help with that gray-700/800/900 or gray-
light/lighter/lightest issue where another colour needs to be added to the
palette between existing values.

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dragonshed
This great. I can't wait to see if I can sneak some of these names into my
next project.

In the past I've used zeke's color-namer[0] package to nail down color names.
But, anything that stops names like $color-bluish-white is a win.

[0][https://github.com/colorjs/color-namer](https://github.com/colorjs/color-
namer)

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Amorymeltzer
Not palettes, but for the authoritative "name" of a given color, I turn to the
results of xkcd's color survey: [https://blog.xkcd.com/2010/05/03/color-
survey-results/](https://blog.xkcd.com/2010/05/03/color-survey-results/) and
the list at [https://xkcd.com/color/rgb/](https://xkcd.com/color/rgb/)

~~~
2J0
This is big business.

Naming colours is a huge money spinning scheme.

Pantone has been given a monopoly because... Because no reason!

Forget open source as in beer software for the moment and let's write truly
international canonical colour name reference.

I will get this going personally next month with anyone willing. I can support
expenses and organise support and removal of all chores. I can ship the
necessary tooling to participate. The project must he nonprofit by nature but
I am fully equipped with the legal resources to trade donated time for real
sweat equity first in line for being proportionally paid without affecting the
nonprofit organ.

I love the idea of what you could achieve with the royalty income - what
happens when the ODSS graphics programme worlf gets a no strings income and
can be hiring and tooling the enterprise wetware necessary for the first rate
conditions that only the big companies enjoy. Non profit charity organisations
don't deprive their own people much anything. Sure enough for real is a
helluva long shot but anyone? Shoot the breeze and scheme at least possible to
collaborate via true accurate color rendition with a little bit of setting up
I'm comfortable with. This is exactly the sort of thing that m6 late
confounding partner wished our enterprise would be doing if our exit fell thru
and his passing sure did (unnecessarily the route wasn't seen by a phalanx of
attorneys highly motivated by closing fees. Ancient history now but I am
speaking with genuinely passionate excitement at the fundamental principles
and practice of the kind of business that is a strategic economic accelerator.
I've decades of experience in media to lecture on why this is so crucial for
business especially in the smaller business strata.

~~~
egypturnash
I think there’s a perfectly good reason for their nigh-monopoly: Pantone has
been clawing their way to the top of the space of talking about color for a
little under sixty years now, with a constantly-updated set of references that
they managed to get into every commercial artist’s toolkit for a big part of
that span of time.

That said a quick check suggests that the average corporate lifespan is
anywhere from 20-60 years, depending on the list, so they may be ripe for
disruption.

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CodiePetersen
This is great stuff. I make video games and its some times hard to find what
colors would go good with others. This is a nice collection I think.

Also, it looks like it would be great for deciding colors for a pitch
deck/presentation. Good stuff.

~~~
aaanotherhnfolk
Another good palette-hunting tool is Adobe Kuler.

It's interactive so you can lock down parameters you like and continue
searching the possibility space

~~~
2J0
Apps like Kuler are IP territorial land grabs.

I'm so disappointed with the level of understanding of colof (and other widely
used and tremendously important knowledge) that if anyone has a London home
for opening a reference library I'd start by filling out a wall with the
books. I long plotted opening a wework like office and furnishing the place
with everything I need to return to business or try build anew bug can't
afford to do simultaneously with buying the lease. You need professional
lighting and environment for reading this kind of subject.

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soonix
I like the color names, but am a bit disappointed there are multiple names for
the same color, e.g. #000000 is 'divorced black' in one palette, and
'contributable black' in another.

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loloroca
I think you can see what colorblind people see with glasses, maybe I don't
know if we all see the same colors or we take it for obvious because we all
set it, what a fear, enter here to see how I see
[https://reason.com/2020/02/26/trump-campaign-files-libel-
law...](https://reason.com/2020/02/26/trump-campaign-files-libel-lawsuit-
against-the-new-york-times/#comment-8146096)

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ebeip90
Some of these palettes aren't accessible to the colorblind. For example,
"gorgeous light lavender" and "endothermic neon blue" are identical to me.

~~~
IgorPartola
Is there some piece of software that can change my screen to show me what a
colorblind person would see? I know red/green is a no no for like 5% of
people, but us there some way to do this systematically?

~~~
schwartzworld
yes! in chrome dev tools
[https://twitter.com/mathias/status/1237393102635012101](https://twitter.com/mathias/status/1237393102635012101)

~~~
mpetroff
Unfortunately, this uses a horribly inaccurate algorithm that's been floating
around the internet for more than a decade [1]. It seems that the Firefox dev
tools do the same thing [2]. As far as I'm concerned, this is worse than not
having such a simulation at all, since it gives people a false sense of
accommodating individuals with color vision deficiencies.

The Colorspacious Python library [3] does a proper job, using the algorithm of
Machado et al. (2009) [4], which is what's considered state-of-the-art.

[1] [https://github.com/MaPePeR/jsColorblindSimulator#the-
colorma...](https://github.com/MaPePeR/jsColorblindSimulator#the-colormatrix-
algorithm) [2] [https://hg.mozilla.org/mozilla-
central/annotate/tip/devtools...](https://hg.mozilla.org/mozilla-
central/annotate/tip/devtools/server/actors/accessibility/constants.js) [3]
[https://colorspacious.readthedocs.io/en/latest/tutorial.html...](https://colorspacious.readthedocs.io/en/latest/tutorial.html#simulating-
colorblindness) [4]
[https://doi.org/10.1109/TVCG.2009.113](https://doi.org/10.1109/TVCG.2009.113)

~~~
hoten
Thanks for taking the time to write this. I shared it with the team.

~~~
mpetroff
Thanks for passing this along. I also commented on the relevant Chromium issue
[1] (as well as the relevant Firefox issue [2]). It should be a simple fix,
since the transformation matrices just need to be updated.

Edit: I should have looked at the Chromium issue again today. It's already
been fixed!

[1]
[https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=100370...](https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=1003700)
[2]
[https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1564993](https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1564993)

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hanoz
Lol, but I was a bit disappointed to find only the individual colours named. I
was expecting to see overly pretentious names for the palettes themselves.

~~~
2J0
uninviting greyish green #82A67D cultrate bright light green #2DFE54 muttering
dusty purple #825F87

#00000 fade to black on poetic combination descriptor

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uryga
if the author(s) are reading this, the names seem to have gotten switched
around on this one:

[https://colors.lol/outward-](https://colors.lol/outward-)

    
    
      outward-bound slate grey      #F19E8E
      unstatesmanlike reddish grey  #98756F
      cross-sectional blush         #58656D
    

the first and last names are swapped.

~~~
picdit
Nice catch (broken link though :) )

~~~
uryga
oh huh! not sure how that happened. here:

[https://colors.lol/outward-bound](https://colors.lol/outward-bound)

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werber
Didn’t know that lol was a tld but i did lol

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code_duck
Hilarious! A good friend is a color designer (selects palettes for major
product lines) and she will love this.

~~~
2J0
It's called being Trade Dress artist of manager, or at least before the
uncalibrated www came along, there was great need for the role and I will
attest the importance of making it a separate job function with direct bottom
line affect.

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yamrzou
It feels so satisfying to be able to finally name these colors.

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reffaelwallen
Is it different from
[https://www.colourlovers.com/](https://www.colourlovers.com/) ?

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foobarian
Even aside from the color names, these color combinations are fantastic! Are
they auto-generated?

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runxel
"Lousy Watermelon"

Thanks for this laugh! :D

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salimmadjd
This is awesome. Bookmarked. Thank you

~~~
picdit
Thank you!

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thecodrr
I took two of your colors, lol. :D hehe Thanks a lot!

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Der_Einzige
This is super awesome. Thank you for making this!

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teslademigod1
great resource with a sense of humor. loving the "contributable black"

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personjerry
Those look like awesome purses

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Razengan
Love the clean UX. Obligatory reminder/request to add wide-color support for
colors-focused apps/services (where it makes sense):

[https://webkit.org/blog/6682/improving-color-on-the-
web/](https://webkit.org/blog/6682/improving-color-on-the-web/)

~~~
picdit
Thanks for sharing that link.

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_eht
annihilating duck egg blue (#C3FBF4) is a personal favorite.

~~~
throwaway_pdp09
Fantastic! Love the onlyworkswithjavascript pure white (#FFFFFF)

