
The Quest for the Next Billion-Dollar Color - relham
https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2018-quest-for-billion-dollar-red/
======
macintux
When I was a kid, I was remarkably incurious. Reasonably smart, I'd like to
think, but it never really occurred to me that everything around me had to be
invented by someone.

The thought that creating a safe, lasting red pigment could be sufficiently
difficult as to be worth millions or billions of dollars is astonishing. To
all the people who've made my world possible, I apologize for my apathy, and
I'll do better.

~~~
ChuckMcM
One of the interesting ways I found out about this was in a history class that
was talking about "royal" fabrics. These were fabrics that only royalty could
own. And while there was the general "lets make a rule to distinguish us from
the common people" there was also that challenge that some colors were so rare
because the pigments were only available to make them in very small
quantities. As a young man it amazed me that people had fights over what color
clothes you could wear or that purple pants would be 10x the expense of white
or grey pants.

~~~
gervase
This led me down a rabbit hole of ancient Roman pricing information! Turns out
that a pair of purple silk pants (it seems purple dye was reserved only for
silk) was actually closer to 2000x more expensive than standard (wool) pants.
Also, the penalty for commoners wearing it was death, so there's that.

~~~
pbhjpbhj
>Therefore, the dye can be collected either by "milking" the snails, which is
more labour-intensive but is a renewable resource, or by collecting and
destructively crushing the snails. David Jacoby remarks that "twelve thousand
snails of Murex brandaris yield no more than 1.4 g of pure dye, enough to
colour only the trim of a single garment."[14] (from Wikipedia, Tirian Purple
//

It's my understanding that it was a badge of the senate, so wearing it would
be like impersonation of a senator. Or worse, impersonation of the Emperor.

Snail Milker isn't a job one hears much of.

Many people will have heard of Lydia from the New Testament of the Holy Bible,
who is referred to as a seller of purple,
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lydia_of_Thyatira](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lydia_of_Thyatira).

~~~
three14
I am suspicious of the 12,000 snail number. I see that people nowadays who
make a similar dye from snails called tekhelet need around 30 snails for each
yarn they dye, which I would guess would extrapolate to the 12,000 being for
an entire garment.

------
uptown
The world of colors (and who "owns" them) is both odd and fascinating. For
instance, Vanta Black can only be used by one artist - Anish Kapoor:

[https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/one-artist-has-
mon...](https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/one-artist-has-monopoly-
worlds-blackest-black-pigment-180958264/)

In response to that rule, another artist created the pinkest pink and a
competing black ... available for anyone in the world to use -- except Kapoor:

[https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/artist-only-
person...](https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/artist-only-person-
banned-using-worlds-pinkest-pink-180961464/)

[http://www.konbini.com/us/inspiration/stuart-semple-new-
vant...](http://www.konbini.com/us/inspiration/stuart-semple-new-vantablack-
paint/)

~~~
cwkoss
Anish Kapoor seems like a huge scumbag

~~~
jdietrich
It's a bit of a gimmick. Vantablack is a highly specialised coating intended
for use in precision optical equipment. It isn't really usable as an art
material because it's prohibitively expensive, it needs to be applied under
laboratory conditions and it's extremely fragile. It's considered a dual-use
technology under arms control legislation and can only be exported under
license.

Semple's feud with Kapoor is similarly gimmicky. He described his Pinkest Pink
(and the ban on selling it to Kapoor) as "like a piece of performance art".

~~~
amyjess
> Semple's feud with Kapoor is similarly gimmicky. He described his Pinkest
> Pink (and the ban on selling it to Kapoor) as "like a piece of performance
> art".

Yes. Kapoor eventually got his hands on some of the Pink, and he published a
photo of him sticking his middle finger in the pigment.

Semple then created a new pigment called Diamond Dust which contains pieces of
broken glass. The whole purpose of Diamond Dust was "I dare you to stick your
finger in _this!_ ".

------
npunt
> For decades, red Lego bricks contained cadmium, a carcinogen.

Ack.

From another article [1]

> One toy to watch out for? “Lego bricks from the ‘70s and ‘80s are the big
> fail,” Andrew Turner, the study’s lead researcher, told the BBC.

> Roar Rude Trangbæk, a spokesperson for Lego, told The Sun that in regards to
> hazardous elements, the company “phased that material out back in 1979 to
> 1981.”

Apparently its both yellow & red bricks. From a forum post [2] about the
phase-out:

> Not much information has ever been given out by TLG in regards to the switch
> from LEGO "with" Cadmium to LEGO without it, except that TLG switched over
> to Cadmium free LEGO in 1973. However, that doesn't really say a lot. Just
> look at the switch from old gray to new gray that started in 2003. It took
> many years for the switch to be complete (old gray elements were still found
> in LEGO sets for many years). So a 1973 switchover likely only means that
> the Bayer Corporation stopped sending TLG red and yellow plastic pellets. As
> for what was still in the TLG inventory.... my guess would be that it
> continued to find its' way into LEGO sets for several years until the supply
> of old red/yellow pellets was finally depleted.

Makes me a bit wary to pass those down to my kids.

[1] [https://offspring.lifehacker.com/your-old-legos-might-be-
tox...](https://offspring.lifehacker.com/your-old-legos-might-be-
toxic-1822608757)

[2]
[https://www.eurobricks.com/forum/index.php?/forums/topic/773...](https://www.eurobricks.com/forum/index.php?/forums/topic/77306-cadmium-
in-lego-bricks/)

~~~
ateesdalejr
I remember biting on my red LEGO bricks as a kid to remove those ones that
would get stuck. Never knew that they contained cadmium 'til now.

~~~
goldenkey
It's no biggy. Plenty of artists consumed way more heavy metals, 10000x more
than kids licking legos. And most didn't become mad hatters or suffer any real
issues. The limits we set in medicine are much lower than what may manifest as
biological damage. Better safe than sorry, right?

~~~
lasc4r
Or they didn't realize they were ever exposed to toxins, and they just think
they got moody over time or that poor memory they have is normal aging.

~~~
goldenkey
Same could be said for asbestos as well as the undiscovered but numerous
carcinogens and toxins we currently use in mass quantities. Every century has
some type of widely used, but toxic, chemical discoveries. This century won't
be any different.

------
cialowicz
Somewhat-related... I just found out about "structural" coloration[1], which
is "production of color by microscopically structured surfaces fine enough to
interfere with visible light".

It took Lexus ~15 years to develop "structural blue", a colorless paint that
creates blue light using this structural interference. The making-of video[2]
is pretty amazing, and definitely worth watching.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Structural_coloration](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Structural_coloration)

[2]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9JU541_zm2w](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9JU541_zm2w)

~~~
tgb
After learning about light interference creating the iridescence of
butterflies and of CDs, I wondered whether you could burn a CD to control the
structure of the CD to change that interference enough to, say, draw an
iridescent image. However, it looks like the writeable elements of a CD are a
too large. With a Bluray though, it might be possible... I haven't tried and
I'm not entirely sure how you'd go about doing it.

~~~
buckminster
LightScribe kind of does this though it's not iridescent. You can also find
some free code to achieve a similar effect on the data side of a disk.

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/LightScribe](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/LightScribe)

~~~
striking
For anyone who was curious: I found this instructable that includes MATLAB
code to generate the data for the image to be burned to the data side of a CD.
[http://www.instructables.com/id/Burning-visible-images-
onto-...](http://www.instructables.com/id/Burning-visible-images-onto-CD-Rs-
with-data-beta/)

This was all I could really find, unfortunately...

------
mmagin
One interesting aspect of red pigment usage that I feel this article could
have explained better is why it fares poorest under the sun: of all the color
pigments, it absorbs the most of the short-wavelength (high energy) light.
Now, you'll naturally think, "but what about black?" Well, most of the black
pigments we use are very chemically stable materials, like powdered carbon or
some iron oxide compounds.

(Once you know this you'll suddenly start to see how a disproportionate share
of red cars have failing paint -- particularly after sometime around the early
1980s when the use of Cadmium pigments started to fall out of favor for most
uses.)

~~~
cnasc
> (Once you know this you'll suddenly start to see how a disproportionate
> share of red cars have failing paint -- particularly after sometime around
> the early 1980s when the use of Cadmium pigments started to fall out of
> favor for most uses.)

I believe this has largely been remediated by using a clear coat over solid
colors. Older cars had single-stage paint for non-metallic colors, so there
would be nothing on top of your nice red paint to protect it. Modern clear
coats typically block UV light, so the color should last much longer (long
enough that your car will be all scratched and swirled well before the color
fades).

~~~
tesseract
The auto industry also pushed for development of new red pigments - Pyrrole
Red is considered quite lightfast, but only became available starting in the
late 80s. I regularly see 90s era red cars on the road with good looking paint
these days. (Yes, the clear coat I'm sure is a factor as well.)

[http://blog.cleveland.com/pdextra/2007/10/pollock_cuts.html](http://blog.cleveland.com/pdextra/2007/10/pollock_cuts.html)

------
ipsum2
I first learned about Yttrium blue from the new AMD Radeon Pro GPUs that are
painted with them. They're really remarkably saturated (Google image search
Radeon Pro WX 7100 for an example)

~~~
throwaway2048
Just keep in mind your monitor really cannot accurately display the colour.

~~~
2bitencryption
a bit ironic, considering your monitor may very well be powered by that
impossibly-blue GPU :)

------
Aardwolf
Is the missing stable red pigment the reason why red clothes give off their
color in the laundry much easier than the other colors?

~~~
logfromblammo
Clothing is usually dyed, rather than inked or painted. Some dyes are better
at attaching to fibers than others, and some synthetic polymer fibers are
notoriously hard to dye.

But on the other hand, some dyes diffuse into certain plastics very easily,
and then never come out. It depends on the chemistry.

The only pigmented clothes I am aware of are "dirt shirts" that are infused
with strongly colored soil. The reddish orange color is undoubtedly iron
oxide, and they will fade with every washing, because there is no binder to
keep the pigment attached to the fiber.

~~~
gwern
One exception is Japanese kakishibu/kaki-shibu: fermented unripe persimmons,
creates a sort of rusty brown red which darkens over time, heavily used in
traditional Japanese clothing for water-resistance and fire protection. People
still like to use it for paper, shirts, and home-made or high-end jeans (eg
[https://www.weargustin.com/store/6683](https://www.weargustin.com/store/6683)
)

------
baxtr
I had a friend in school whose father would work at a local chemical plant. He
used to say: “Did you know that red as a color isn’t stable? Just look at all
the old red cars, they are so pale”. I’m ashamed to say, that I thought that
was total BS. Now, years later, I know better and will remember this every
time I see an old red car. You should too.

PS: I think I’ll call him up tomorrow

~~~
woolvalley
Also look at hair salons with all of their old pictures of hair styles on the
front window and notice how blue they all are.

------
gondolgames
Is there a museum for these extreme colors? (Like the blue in the article or
the pink in this video -
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_NzVmtbPOrM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_NzVmtbPOrM))

~~~
pg_bot
There is the Forbes pigment collection at Harvard's art museum.

[https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2015/09/a-wall-of-
col...](https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2015/09/a-wall-of-color-a-
window-to-the-past/)

------
whalesalad
This reminds me of the 15+ years of work Lexus put into their new 'structural
blue' color. It was designed to mimic the American Morpho butterfly. Color
comes from the assembly of structures rather than pigment (there is no blue
material used during the creation of the paint) Pretty wild stuff.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nYu1ruSakRg](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nYu1ruSakRg)

------
sgillen
Very cool how the search for a material for use in computing led to a better
blue pigment. Reminds me of all the technologies developed during the space
race or for the military that wound up being use in every day applications.

------
pnathan
colors are a fascinating subspecialty of the coatings industry.

YInMin blue is stupid expensive. A typical oil paint sells for between 13 and
$60. One company trialed YInMn, and asked for $200 per tube to use up their
samples, as I recall.

[https://www.gamblincolors.com/new-blue-color-oil-paint-
yinmn...](https://www.gamblincolors.com/new-blue-color-oil-paint-yinmn-blue/)

Take a look at their review.

------
KingMob
I'm surprised nobody picked up on this mistake about colors: "Modern computers
can display about 16.8 million of them, far more than people can see or
printers can reproduce."

No, that's far more than people can DISTINGUISH, but we can certainly see them
all, and printers can reproduce them. In fact, monitors (even the new higher-
gamut monitors) can't cover the full range of human vision, so there are
plenty of hues we can see that monitors can't make.

------
mhomde
Speaking of red... In Sweden we have a color called "Falu red" that's the icon
red that long has been put on many cottages and houses. The pigment is based
on the copper in the copper mines of Falun. The metal helps against fungal
infestion and absorbs UV rays helping the paint last longer. There are some
areas where it's the only color allowed to help preserve their heritage.

[https://www.theawl.com/2017/12/falu-red-the-color-of-
bucolic...](https://www.theawl.com/2017/12/falu-red-the-color-of-bucolic-
barns-and-mummified-swedes/)

As a bonus or most famous sausage is called "Falukorv", it's also red.

~~~
efraim
The pigment in Falu rödfärg is not based on copper, it's iron oxide, a
byproduct from the copper mine.

------
scythe
I'm a little confused at the safety claims. Manganese is a cumulative poison:

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manganism](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manganism)

I'm not really qualified to quantify the toxicity of metals, but the chemists
I've known are usually very careful when they have to work with manganese.

~~~
tathougies
Typically, the toxicity of metals depend on how they're structured within
molecules. For example, inorganic copper is cytotoxic, while organic copper is
necessary for survival. In this case, the yttrium blue has a unique chemical
structure. More so, I believe they use Manganese oxide to create the color.
Manganese oxide is not dangerous, as far as we know, at least. It's a somewhat
common food additive. According to
[wikipedia]([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manganese(II)_oxide](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manganese\(II\)_oxide)),
we consume tons of it per year.

Ultimately, what typically matters is how a molecule interacts with the body,
not necessarily how each component interacts. By that measure, Cyanide (which
is just carbon + nitrogen) ought to have no ill effect, while cuprous oxide
ought to be poisonous.

------
Abishek_Muthian
Not to nitpick,

> Raised in Chennai, on the southeastern coast of India

> After getting his doctorate in chemistry at the Indian Institute of
> Technology at Madras

Madras is just the colonial name for Chennai, which is currently the name of
the city and the capital of the sate - Tamilnadu.

Wonderful article, we've taken the colors for granted; Subramanian didn't and
I'm glad that it has rewarded him.

~~~
boundlessdreamz
The article is right. It is Indian Institute of Technology, Madras (1) and not
Indian Institute of Technology, Chennai.

"Madras" above is part of the institute's name and it would take an amendment
of the IIT act to rename it but I don't think it will happen.

1\. [https://www.iitm.ac.in/](https://www.iitm.ac.in/)

------
lanius
Where can I view these brilliant colors in person? Apparently these colors are
so vibrant, they cannot be accurately displayed on monitors:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_NzVmtbPOrM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_NzVmtbPOrM)

~~~
splintercell
One of the most unique blues I've seen is 'Baystate Blue' it's a fountain pen
ink [1], cameras and screen doesn't capture how beautiful this ink is. This
ink is also highly controversial in fountain pen community because it is
accused of destroying fountain pens. (Also you drop it on plastic, and you'd
need to use bleach to get it off), but man I love this ink.

1\.
[http://www.inksandpens.com/content/images/2015/09/IMG_5211.j...](http://www.inksandpens.com/content/images/2015/09/IMG_5211.jpg)

------
violatorrrr
So, is there more to YInMn blue than mixing proportions of these elements and
kiln-firing them in a crucible?

Because if that's all there is to it, then what's to stop me from
experimenting to find the best proportions and personally violating any
patents, for my own DIY projects?

------
animal531
I first heard of the fading red problem on a luxury yacht show, where the
clients' new cushions kept fading in the sun, which was a bit of a problem for
the outfitting company.

It's amazing what random facts you pick up wherever.

------
NL807
> Modern computers can display about 16.8 million of them, far more than
> people can see

Not quite true. The colour gamut of most (in not all) displays is much smaller
than the gamut we can see.

~~~
wirelessest
This is always misreported. It's true that we can't distinguish between two
adjacent rgb values (in most cases, on most displays...), which is where this
comes from. But as you say, displays only cover a portion of the space.

The easiest example I usually give is with blacks-- computer monitors just
can't reproduce the absence of light well.

------
chiefalchemist
What amazes and dumbfounds me is that there are still colors we haven't
discovered. A perfect example of: we don't know what we don't know.

------
randlet
Cool article. The title made me think this was going to be an article from
2011 about Color the company [1]

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_Labs](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_Labs)

------
Apocryphon
Could use a snappier name. How about Hooloovoo?

------
apotheothesomai
They could invent it, but to most of us men, it's just going to look like a
pre-existing red. We don't do color distinctions very well. We've got bright
red, pale red, and in-between.

~~~
npongratz
Indeed. Tetrachromacy is real, and men are unlikely to enjoy the superpower:

[http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20140905-the-women-with-
supe...](http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20140905-the-women-with-super-human-
vision)

~~~
giggles_giggles
Tetrachromacy is real but vanishingly rare. However, I've read before that
women have more bars and cones in their eyes than men & therefore better color
reception, without being tetrachromatic.

~~~
ChuckMcM
I suspected my wife was a tetrachromat when we started debating what color
something was. There are the "standard" arguments about is that blue or green
or is that red or purple. But these were around yellow. Where she clearly saw
two different yellows I could not distinguish them. She is unwilling to get
the genetic test though, no matter how much I encourage her.

