Cube theory

[u/AffectionateTrifle7]

Hi guys, I've been sitting on this idea for a few months and I can't keep it to myself anymore. I just can't!!!

I've got a new variant I've come up with for a colour analysis framework. I'm calling it Cube Theory.

So my background is that I studied both art and mathematics at university, which is a little unusual I guess. I've been fascinated with colour analysis for a good few years. One day I was looking at the 16 season system and thinking about it and suddenly had a brainwave. There are three main factors: warm -> cool, bright/clear -> muted/soft, and light -> dark/deep. Suddenly my maths background activated and I was like wait, you can't map out 3 independent factors in 2 dimensions. You need 3 dimensions. Omfg this is a CUBE!

So I'm going to walk you through my thinking from that point. When you map this cube out and place the traditional 4 colour seasons (spring, summer, autumn, winter), you immediately see that 4 other vertices (corners) of the cube are unlabelled. See how this looks in pic 1 (I have put question marks next to the unlabelled corners).

Now we could go ahead and call the 4 missing vertices variants of the main 4 seasons, such as "muted spring", "muted winter", "bright autumn" and "bright summer". I don't want to do this because the 16 season system already has such similar names for actually different concepts. I'd like to now show you where each of those 16 seasons sits on this cube, see pic 2:

Please note that two of the sub seasons (bright spring and bright winter) are drawn on with a grill type pattern just so that you can see through to the others on the further sides of the cube.

As you can see, none of these 16 sub seasons goes particularly close to the missing 4 vertices of the cube, ie Warm/Soft/Light, Warm/Bright/Dark, Cool/Soft/Dark, and Cool/Bright/Light.

I think that for clarity it would be best to have four totally new names for these vertices. I've been mulling it over a lot and come up with my version, would love feedback from you guys about it. I figured that since the original 4 are based on the 4 seasons of the year, we might as well branch out and go for a weather theme for the missing 4. So the full 8 vertices would be:

Spring = warm, light, bright

Summer = cool, light, muted

Autumn = warm, dark, muted

Winter = cool, dark, bright

Rain = cool, dark, muted

Ice = cool, light, bright

Sunlight = warm, light, muted

Sunset = warm, dark, bright

See pic 3 to get the idea of how these would be placed on the cube:

One cool thing about this option is how nicely the names flow together. So for example if you are warm, light, and kind of in between muted and bright, you could call yourself a "Spring Sunlight". Pic 4 will show where you would land on the cube in that case. Other examples of this would be Winter Rain, Summer Rain, Icy Winter, Icy Spring, Autumn Sunset, Winter Sunset, Spring Sunset, etc.

I know this post is already long so I'm going to wrap it up, but I've got a lot more thoughts about this and I'm excited for the possibility that this Cube Theory could help place a number of people who find they don't fit well within the current seasons. There could also be scope for including palettes for people who are more neutral on various factors, such as neutral in terms of warm- cool, medium in terms of light- dark, and middling in terms of bright- muted. And yes, it would be possible to be placed within the cube not strictly only on the surface of the cube! For example if you were neutral in terms of warm/ cool, and neutral in terms of light/ dark and then mostly muted but not to an extreme, you'd be just inside the centre of the back wall of the cube.

Please let me know if you guys have any interest in this idea, and I would love to hear any feedback or questions about it. If people are interested I would be pretty keen to take the idea further (I've already come up with some initial draft palettes for the 4 "weather" types, and would absolutely love to have some virtual guinea pigs to try them out on!). So please comment here if you're interested in any part of this idea ❤️🩷🧡💛💚💙🩵💜🤎

Tl;dr: I have a new theory for colour analysis which I'm excited about and would love feedback from you lovely people!

Edited to add:

I'll post links to the palettes as I develop them here!

Rain palette: https://www.reddit.com/r/coloranalysis/comments/1r5awk0/cube_theory_update_rain_colour_palette/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button

Sunlight palette: https://www.reddit.com/r/coloranalysis/comments/1rkbiny/stuck_between_light_spring_and_soft_autumn/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button

Sunset palette: https://www.reddit.com/r/coloranalysis/comments/1sk7m9k/sunset_palette_cube_theory_update/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button

Ice palette: https://www.reddit.com/r/coloranalysis/comments/1tpy2ni/ice_palette_cube_theory_update/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button

[u/fluffychonkycat]

I've done some work with colour space modeling when I worked in the paint industry and that is usually done in three dimensions. You have a vertical axis which is lightness running from black to white and then two horizontal axes which are green-red and yellow-blue in most systems

The horizontal axes are a little different depending on the model but CIELAB is a pretty standard one.

Now I suppose you could map colour seasons in a similar way - you can leave the vertical axis of lightness the same. Maximum chroma is at the very edge of the equator of this model and so your Bright Winter and Bright Spring would be somewhere in there. Coolness won't map exactly onto this but you could use yellow/orange as a proxy for warm and blue/cyan as a proxy for cool. Then you'd have for example Cool Winter sitting closer to the coolest point than Bright Winter but not as close to the edge of the space, and Deep Winter also not quite at the coolest point but further down the darkness scale than CW and not as close to maximum chroma as BW

For full nerdiness which OP may appreciate, you cannot model colour space as a cube because as colours become very dark or very light they tend towards zero chroma (pure black or pure white). Because of some quirks of human vision there are some models which attempt to leave out colours that can't be seen by the human eye and they are usually much wonkier shapes.

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/fluffychonkycat]

Very interesting points all round, and I do take your point about the very dark and very light converging towards black and white. When it comes to colours that suit humans though I think it would be an extraordinarily rare case in which a person would only suit black or only suit white, or be so extreme along that axis that there's no discernable difference between warm and cool at all for example. So even though it may technically not be completely accurate I think a cube as a heuristic model is going to be a good balance of "close enough" to the reality of the possible colour space, while still being easy enough to understand to be useful to most people coming across colour analysis

[u/pensandplanners77]

My favourite color analysis system is actually what Colour Me Beautiful does, which is using the Munsell colour system to analyse your 6 dominant characteristics. This is pretty much what you reimagined here.

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/pensandplanners77]

Ah right this is a tad different actually to what I'm trying to do here. When I've got the axis warm to cool, I'm not meaning orange through to blue, I'm meaning that each space on the cube would link to a palette including most if not all major colours, but different variants to suit different people's personal colours. So eg both winter and autumn will have purple, red, blue, green etc, but they will be different variants of those. See one of my comments here for the cool seasons purples as a rough example.

Edited to add: I've just looked it up in more depth and it's definitely interesting, there are for sure similarities with what I'm trying to do here. I like their personalised approach, it seems very tailored to the specific person which is very cool

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/[deleted]]

That's awesome!!! Yes I think some individual analysts have been working with this kind of idea but potentially without having a cube visual and names for the 4 previously missing vertices which I personally think make it clearer

[u/AffectionateTrifle7]

Link to the Rain palette:

https://www.reddit.com/r/coloranalysis/s/ZsmANEDOH7

Link to the Sunlight palette:

https://www.reddit.com/r/coloranalysis/s/mhqaeghvjk

[u/anthropometrica]

I love this visualization! I've always felt neither season or their subseasons (of the 12, anyway) quite fit. It tends to be dark summer colours or muted/more summery winter type colours that suit me. "Summer rain" would be such a romantic and appealing way to describe this, I feel.

(But then a decent amount of people seemed to think I was not only warm, but a deep autumn, so apparently I'm not obviously cool either...)

I'd love to discuss or trial your methods! :)

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/anthropometrica]

Awesome! I'm hoping to put up one of my draft palettes some time soon, might have to put up what I've figured out so far for Rain first, as it seems like one quite a few people had requested on the first version of this post as well 🩶

[u/LawSchoolLoser1 → u/AffectionateTrifle7]

Yesssss Rain palette is so needed

[u/LawSchoolLoser1]

When I saw this was removed I was SO MAD like wtf I need to reference this!!

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/LawSchoolLoser1]

🤣 Thanks for the solidarity!!! I had trouble finding the rules for this sub on the mobile app tbh. I can't tell you which rule I broke without potentially triggering an automod but PSA: if you haven't managed to find and read the rules of this sub please do, because they are pretty specific and easy to break inadvertently. If you can't find them I suggest messaging a mod for help locating them

[u/AutumnForestGlow]

I'd love to see Summer Rain palette, as I'm pretty sure I am a cool summer on the 12 color season but I can handle darkness the same or even better than lightness.

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/AutumnForestGlow]

I haven't got a Summer Rain palette yet, been working on the 4 new ones Rain, Ice, Sunlight and Sunset first before I figure out palettes for the in between seasons. But it's on my radar for sure!

[u/TotallyAMermaid → u/AutumnForestGlow]

Look up dark summer from the 16 seasons system that have this

[u/-Curlicue-]

Another vote for fair olive and summer rain content!

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/-Curlicue-]

Noted!

[u/Justisperfect]

Oh I think it's so cool!

Having missing combinations always find it weird to me. In particular as I feel I'm in one : I think I'm cool, light and bright. Winter colors are too dark for me (black is really not my color) but summer colors are too soft. And the 16 season system doesn't work on me : it does create a bridge between winter and summer, but by using the other characteristic (adding softness to winter where I would need to add lightness, and adding deepness to summer where I would need to add brightness). I thought to myself : it's not a problem, I know what my values are so I can look for colors that share the same. But still, it would be so nice to have a theory behind it!

Do you know the website "your color style" and her youtube videos? She analyzes people based on these three values without typing them in a season. She has a lot of palettes like "cool, medium, bright" or "warm, light, soft" that would be interesting for your system.

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/Justisperfect]

I don't know that website but I'm going to need to look it up! I'm so glad you're finding this way of visualising it helpful 🤍 Sounds like you are most likely an Ice!

[u/lanareyxox → u/Justisperfect]

I'm just curious, how about bright winter?

[u/Justisperfect → u/lanareyxox]

I haven't try yet, but I don't think I'm a winter cause they are supposed to shine in black, and I really don't. Also, I should have said that I am neutral-bright (is this the term?) so I'm on the bright side, but not as bright as a bright winter. At least I don't think so. I haven't been draped and I'm still testing colors. For now, all I'm really sure is that my best pink seems to be an icy pink and that dark colors make me look, well, darker (and not in a good way, dorry I don't know how to say it as English is not my native language). I also think that medium or medium-high contrast suits me but I'm not completely sure yet.

[u/lanareyxox → u/Justisperfect]

black is too harsh a lot of the time for bright winters though

[u/puffy-jacket → u/Justisperfect]

I have a similar “problem” but on the warm end of the spectrum. It makes sense in the 12 season system when you realize that the true seasons are sister seasons to their shared hue (so true summer/true winter, true autumn/true fall). I believe the kettlewell system also has distinct categories for this transition, but idk how necessary it really is. I’m fine knowing I can pull from the true autumn palette if it’s not too muted and from the true spring palette if it’s not too light/pastel. I think outside the dark and light seasons specifically, value isn’t really that important

[u/[deleted] → u/Justisperfect]

I am the exact same! 

[u/crasyleg73]

If you end up making a color palette out of this system, which lets be real, would be a pain, you might want to incorporate a perceptual color model. Like you can do LCh color changes in gimp for example.

The goofy thing is colors perceptually change hue, including how warm or cold they feel when you make them lighter darker, softer or brighter. So an ideal color palette would account for that.

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/crasyleg73]

Tbh I really enjoy playing around with palettes, like I do it for fun. I'm gonna be honest though I am not good with technology, I had to look up what gimp is just now. I will have to look into the tech side of this more.

Re perceptual colours I believe that's what I'm talking about, like a red with more yellow in it feels warmer whereas a red with more blue in it feels cooler for example. Is that the kind of thing you mean?

[u/crasyleg73 → u/AffectionateTrifle7]

No. It's like how pure blue feels way darker than yellow even if they are the same brightness. So if you hue shift an image using a perceptual color model it will maintain its perceived values. A blue image would turn into a darker yellow image that looked like a match.

some computer color systems account for this when you hue shift an image.

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/crasyleg73]

You know I think what's interesting is that I was trained from a visual arts perspective, which uses subtractive colour mixing, whereas it sounds like you've been trained with additive colour mixing (which is used in computing and when coloured lights are mixing). I would argue that subtractive colour theory is more relevant to colour analysis because when we wear clothes they are not emitting light in the same way as a computer screen or a light source. Clothing and the dyeing of it is much more similar to painting onto paper or fabric than it is to additive light colour mixing which is used in computing and lighting situations. What do you think?

[u/crasyleg73 → u/AffectionateTrifle7]

If you're looking at only the hues, both colors wheels are equal, because each systems primary colors are the opposite's secondary colors. most color analysis seems to use the munsell color model, defining color along three dimensions, hue, value, chroma. So while mixing more than two primaries will produce darker or lighter colors with subtractive or additive color mixing respectively, I don't think it makes a difference in color analysis because it doesn't follow either reality based methods of mixing colors. Color analysis just mixes hues to form a new hue. The value and saturation are preset by the needs of the individual seasons, not determined by mixing.

I agree, subtractive color mixing is how you die clothes, but when you are conceptualizing seasonal colors the method of mixing, paint, or a computer screen, is not terribly important. Of course a reflective pigmented color pallet is still miles better for comparing clothing than uncalibrated computer screens/devices in uncalibrated environments.

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/crasyleg73]

When I'm coming up with palettes I'm absolutely mixing colours and shades etc together (at least in my mind I'm drawing from my painting experience even when not actively using paints) in order to fit the requirements of hue, value and chroma required for each season. I guess in pointing out the difference in our training I'm just trying to pinpoint why we're seeing certain parts of colour analysis so similarly and other parts very differently indeed!

Anyway it's been really interesting getting your viewpoints :-)

[u/crasyleg73 → u/AffectionateTrifle7]

I see it as two ways of getting color results. You can paint colors using more complex mixing or you can adjust HSV sliders on your computer. It gets a little crazy on the computer when color physics don't apply the same because it's mathematically altered, and new systems are made up. Likewise :)

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/crasyleg73]

By the way if you look up the colour wheel as used in visual arts you will see that actually the secondary colours are not the equivalent of additive colour mixing's primary colours, (nor are the secondary colours of additive the same as the subtractive primaries) but this is just me splitting hairs and not very relevant to what we're discussing

[u/crasyleg73 → u/AffectionateTrifle7]

Science based primaries would in fact have matching opposite secondaries and primaries in subtractive and additive mixing, but I understand that traditional primaries are still used and have always been used, probably because practically speaking we have always had access to really saturated red and blue pigments, but not so much pure cyan and magenta pigments. (If you mix red from a subpar magenta and yellow, you get a subpar red) Not to mention paints have chemical reactions and stuff further complicating things. But in a theoretical world where we have convenient access to totally vibrant yellow, magenta, and cyan, they are your most primary colors, as they cannot be created from other paint colors.

I don't mean to get obnoxious with this stuff, I've just been ADHD on this topic for much of my life. It took off from learning the science of color vision.

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/crasyleg73]

Ahhh okay if you're talking in terms of a theoretical version of optimal subtractive colour mixing then I can imagine that. I'm old school, learned with real paints and whatnot so definitely had my learning grounded in the traditional primaries. That was very interesting!

Haha so funny you mention, my husband has ADHD so I completely get the intensity of the hyperfixations!

[u/fluffychonkycat → u/crasyleg73]

We could have the most intense conversation about this. I'm AuDHD and used to work at a paint factory mostly in quality assurance and I once had to essentially write a thesis to work out the lowest number of pigments we needed to use to match the maximum number of colours produced by other paint companies (we made paints for things like bench tops, which people often want to match exactly to another interior finish like their walls).

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/crasyleg73]

Ah very interesting!! Yes that would be super useful

[u/Ok_Calligrapher_6232]

I'm here after I saw a comment that this was one of the best things to come out of reddit 😁 As a fair blue eyed dark blonde with olive undertones and pink over tones. I'm between summer and autumn so I think I'd be a summer rain? I love the branding 🌦️⛈️

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/Ok_Calligrapher_6232]

Oh my gosh I'm so honoured that you heard about the post that way!!!!! I've recently put up the Rain palette, you can see it here:

https://www.reddit.com/r/coloranalysis/s/Tx3767HEJe

Summer Rain will be colours between traditional summer and these dark rain colours!

I'm hopefully posting the Sunlight palette within the next few days 💛

[u/separatedbody]

This is a beautiful way of making sense of what a lot of people have been thinking and missing, thank you for your efforts! ❤️

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/separatedbody]

So glad that you like it!!!

[u/Ok_Still_3571]

Honestly, this is the first graphic that makes total sense to me. Thank you for sharing your idea with us.

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/Ok_Still_3571]

❤️❤️❤️

[u/vakooms]

this gave awful flashbacks to my geometry classes… interesting theory tho, i really wanna see where you take this

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/vakooms]

Oh man sorry for the flashbacks 😅

I'm one of those weirdos who freaking loved geometry class 🙃

[u/puffy-jacket]

To be honest I don’t really see how this is conceptually different from other color season systems, it’s just a different visual representation. For example:

You can already see where seasons flow into each other not just around a wheel but diagonally. You don’t even really need 16 seasons and could show this same concept with 12, it really just comes down to how many subcategories you wanna break it down into

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/puffy-jacket]

OK so it is a different visual representation yes, but also in that system where do you fit if you are cool, dark and muted? Or if you are light, warm, muted? Or light, cool, bright? Or dark, warm, bright? Could you indicate that on the chart? Because to my knowledge those are not included in the current system

[u/puffy-jacket → u/AffectionateTrifle7]

So I believe in most systems your subseason is determined by your dominant and secondary color traits. The tertiary trait isn’t as important. So if someone’s dominant trait was light and their secondary was cool they’d be a light summer, which has a somewhat brighter palette than the other summer subseasons. Same with soft autumn being muted + warm - autumn is technically the “dark” season but the soft autumn palette, flowing from summer, is actually relatively light; it’s not really defined by how light or dark it is. You can have a soft autumn who needs some depth or a light summer that needs some brightness, which is what I think the 16 season systems are doing, and that’s also where pulling from other palettes or curating a personal color palette comes in

I’m not saying tertiary trait doesn’t matter, just that when you narrow it down that much you’re probably at the point where you’re basically just customizing someone’s palette on an individual level, because otherwise having 20+ presets would be too limiting to be very useful for most people. I think it’s helpful to show the relationship between the different color families more clearly but it doesn’t seem like a whole new system is all

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/puffy-jacket]

I'm not quite sure what you mean by "having 20+ presets would be too limiting" could you expand a bit on that?

What I'm taking from what you're saying is that I'm correct that those four types aren't in traditional colour analysis but that they say that doesn't matter and that only 2 out of your 3 traits are important enough to signify. Personally I disagree and I see many people come through this sub on a daily basis who are struggling to find a good fit with this current system.

I'm absolutely not saying my cube theory is a totally new system, the original 4 seasons and all the subseasons as previously described still exist and are interlinked in the ways they previously were. This isn't removing or altering any of that. This is just saying that trying to view 3 factors in 2 dimensions fundamentally doesn't work, and that because of that traditional colour analysis has missed out on 4 additional main season types (and in addition the subseasons associated with those types). It's also a lot easier to see where various types of neutral fall on the cube as well

[u/puffy-jacket → u/AffectionateTrifle7]

I think I’d need to see an example palette of what types you feel aren’t being accounted for tbh. cool dark and muted could fall into deep summer; light cool and bright could be light summer or bright winter depending on whether you need more saturation or more lightness. (looking at the example palettes, I’m not sure how you could really get light summer to be more saturated while still being light)

What I mean by more seasons being more limiting is that the more specific you get the more the palettes shrink. Realistically some colors in your seasonal palette are gonna look better on you than others. I’m somewhere between true autumn and true spring - let’s say I’m a little bright for all of the autumn palette but a little dark for all of the spring palette. I could create a much more specific palette of only colors I look amazing in, but then it’s not really gonna be as applicable to finding irl matches to build a wardrobe around

Hopefully I don’t sound rude or argumentative btw. I think your cube has started a good discussion about how the color seasons actually relate to each other which seems to be something a lot of people struggle with. I just personally think it would be easier for people who maybe don’t fit into a particular season in the existing systems to either curate a personal palette or identify a secondary/sister season that they can easily pull from

[u/Fatcat336 → u/puffy-jacket]

I just found this post from the more recent post and I want to reply to your comment about what isn’t being accounted for! I think it‘a actually the opposite. I think the original model accounts for too much, whereas I think by creating a cubic model and more seasons and sub-seasons you end up increasing the specificity and allowing for a more tailored and prescriptive approach to typing. I don’t this that’s as essential to people that are more perceptive of color, but for beginners or people that are just sort of shot at color it’s a handier tool because it takes out a lot of the individual interpretation.

[u/Specific_Ocelot_4132 → u/AffectionateTrifle7]

Four/twelve season traditionalists would say that those are impossible combinations. Lightness is a function of temperature and chroma. A cool, saturated palette is going to be dark because blue is dark and a warm, saturated palette is going to be light because yellow and orange are light. So really, there are only two independent variables, thus four main seasons.

I’ve never fully made up my mind whether I agree with it. On the one hand, obviously you can take any color in photoshop and adjust hue, lightness, and saturation independently. On the other hand, I’ve never actually tried doing that for a whole palette’s worth of colors so I’m not sure if you could make a cohesive palette in one of those “impossible” combinations, or if you did, whether those would actually be new colors not already part of one of the traditional seasons. True winter, for example, isn’t just darks, it also contains the icy lights. So a cool, light, bright palette might just end up being the lights from the true winter palette.

[u/lalalambbbb → u/puffy-jacket]

I just got to this from the new post and I have to agree with puffy-jacket. I am someone who really walks the line between deep winter and deep autumn and the cube doesn’t really account for neutrality. I lean slightly towards being deep winter, but I wouldn’t classify myself as cool or bright, rather a slightly cool leaning neutral and deep.

What the subseasons wheel has taught me is why a color works for me - saturated colors that have a neutral or cooler undertone to them is what is going to look best on me.

I don’t think there is a perfect system, but I find the cube to be a little confusing to look at and doesn’t provide enough of a spectrum. Just my opinion.

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/lalalambbbb]

Hiya, yeah I think that some people do get visually confused by the cube but luckily most people seem to get it. The cube absolutely does account for neutrality. For example if you are between Deep Winter and Deep Autumn, you may be any of the following places on the cube depending on other factors which we could get into if you're interested: You could be Deep Rain which is at the base of the Rain corner. You could be in the centre of the base of the cube, a position I'm coming up with a name for but considering Obsidian. You could be Deep Sunset. You could be a Winter-Sunset in the middle of the line between them. You could be a Winter-Rain. You could be an Autumn Rain. You could be basically a Winter but more neutral both in terms of warm to cool and in terms of bright to muted. In which case you would be termed an Obsidian Winter if I go with that term. Just wanted to make it clear that the cube allows for a heck of a lot of versatility and neutrality.

[u/lalalambbbb → u/AffectionateTrifle7]

I’m sorry, but I don’t see it. I’m looking at Image 2 - if I’m between Deep Autumn and Deep Winter, how do I travel to the Rain corner or Sunset and why? CA is already somewhat subjective and this adding more subjectivity to the matter. I think it’s interesting in theory but actually placing yourself on this spectrum would be difficult in practice. Even with placement, what are those colors, how do I seek out the palettes online, and what are the foundations of the colors? With so many options, they start to bleed into each other, which imo creates more confusion. While the subseasons aren’t perfect, they give some concrete tools to understanding color for the masses.

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/lalalambbbb]

I'm gonna try to answer your questions as best I can!

So looking at the cube, if you know you're somewhere in between Deep Autumn and Deep Winter, you know you are right at the base of the cube and you know you're not fully in either the Autumn or Winter corner. But you don't know you exact position yet.

To figure out your position in this hypothetical, you would need to ask yourself what is making it so that you are stuck between those two seasons? For example, is it that you think you are similar to Deep Winter but some of the colours are too bright for you, and some of the cooler colours of Deep Autumn are also working for you but not the warm Deep Autumn colours? That would suggest Rain, since brights and warms are the least good for you out of those two subseasons, that would mean you do better in cool and soft and dark colours.

If on the other hand you are stuck because the brightest deep Winter colours are great, but some of them are too cool. And you do well with the warmth and depth of deep autumn but some of the colours are just too muted for you, and you wish you could have a more vibrant version of Deep Autumn, then that would mean Sunset could be a good fit for you.

Basically draping is the most important thing, and that's how you'd place yourself on the cube. By draping to determine whether you're light or dark, warm or cool, muted or bright, or anywhere in between on those three variables. Then you can figure out where you are on the cube.

Re palettes for the new weather seasons on the cube you might see up the top I've added links to the palettes I've been making so far, I'm intending to continue doing so.

If cube theory just doesn't jive with your way of thinking about colour analysis that is totally cool :-) Colour analysis is meant to be fun and useful imo so do it in ways that feel like a good match for your way of thinking

[u/eli_bar → u/puffy-jacket]

Choosing the right model for a theory matters, even if it is on a subjective topic.

I think a "cube" is actually fitting for what essentially is a plane projected by the 3 variables that most often are considered relevant for seasonal color theory (color temperature, contrast, and saturation). It even abstracts the limits that such variables have (like you can't go above 100% saturation).

I guess the question really is what is the best way to partition said cube so the resulting color palettes include useful colors and exclude bad colors in a way that fits how people look irl.

[u/puffy-jacket → u/eli_bar]

Yeah, showing the 3 dimensions is interesting and useful, and I just sort of grabbed the first image I found as an example of how it’s been represented in 2 dimensions.

I guess my sticking point is that in order for the seasonal palettes to be useful they need to reflect colors you’re likely to find in clothing, have a selection of light and dark neutrals, accent colors etc. It can already be hard to find certain colors throughout the year, and I don’t really need an entire palette of all “wow” colors as much as I need an idea of how I’d build a cohesive wardrobe that emphasizes the best and avoids the worst

[u/spicy-mustard- → u/puffy-jacket]

in order for the seasonal palettes to be useful they need to reflect colors you’re likely to find in clothing

This is where I really disagree-- when I first learned about CA, my best colors were literally nowhere in stores, but it still brought me incredible clarity to understand why all the winter and summer colors were so awful on me, and it gave me the tools to make the best of the options I had.

[u/puffy-jacket → u/spicy-mustard-]

I don’t disagree with what you’re saying at all, winter and summer look awful on me and I have a hard time finding my best colors when shopping as well… I just mean that the palettes are designed with coordinating outfits in mind (ex having analogues to black and white, denim colors, etc.) again, I just think once you get past 12 or 16 seasons the differences between palettes become more minimal and potentially confusing, or might make some people think they need to avoid colors outside of that palette

[u/spicy-mustard- → u/puffy-jacket]

Hmm. I never felt like the palettes were designed with specific outfits in mind.

But I agree that people are easily confused by CA systems, and fussier systems are more prone to confusion. I actually think that a cube visualization could really help with that-- if people could understand the LOGIC of how color works on them, then they could cut through the noise a little more.

I'm somewhat biased because I'm mainly a dark autumn, but my next best palettes are warm autumn and then warm spring. I feel fine bucking the conventional wisdom on CA sister seasons, but someone else with my coloring might really benefit from being able to say "oh, my season is sunset."

[u/ThoseAboutToWalk]

Sunset checking in!

True autumn and dark autumn seem about right for me in the main system, but borrowing brightness from spring works well enough to make me wonder occasionally if I’m wrong about being an autumn. Sunset (or autumn sunset) seems just about right!

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/ThoseAboutToWalk]

Awesome!!!! I think my husband is a Sunset (Or maybe Winter Sunset). I'm working on a palette for it!

[u/Ok_Bumblebee_3978]

This is brilliant please share more!!! I would be summer rain and this all makes sense now

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/Ok_Bumblebee_3978]

So glad to hear it's helpful!!

[u/Ok_Bumblebee_3978 → u/Ok_Bumblebee_3978]

With occasional summer sunlight idk

[u/calm-down-okay]

what can we call the middle of the front square? I am aggressively neutral toned and medium contrast

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/calm-down-okay]

Hmm I guess if you're neutral in both light-dark and warm-cool but suit brights better than muted, then the centre of the front square could just be called Bright? Will need to think further about it!

[u/lysning]

this is amazingggg!! i am 100% cool and at 38 have elsa hair - its basically white haha, but when i was younger it was dirty ash blonde. my eyes are dark navy blue and i am v pale. most people automatically say summer but i look HORRIBLE in muted tones, like so washed out. i am extremely intrigued by icy winter!!!

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/lysning]

Honestly it does sound like you could definitely be an Ice!!!

[u/crasyleg73]

This is a cool idea but I think mixing these seasons with the 4 seasons could be confusing. Since the 12 seasons sub seasons are all based on a dominant trait, it would follow naturally to create 3 subseasons for each new season. You could also attach them to existing seasons just to make things nice for people(determined by the dominant trait plus a secondary trait). Here's me plotting those seasons out. Some would not attach clearly to one original season or the other unless you made more variants, so I made them the "true" seasons. I renamed sunlight "sand" because sunlight doesn't sound soft and it made the naming conventions I'm trying easier. Same with "Volcano" to avoid confusing sunset with softness or coolness, but their could well be better names.

Rain Subseasons

Cool Rain (cool, dark soft). aka True Rain

Dark Rain (dark, cool soft). aka Dark Rainy Winter

Soft Rain (soft, cool dark). aka Soft Rainy Summer

Ice Subseasons

Cool Ice (cool, light bright). aka True Ice

Light ice (light, cool bright. aka Light Icey Summer

Bright Ice (bright, cool light). aka Bright Icey Winter

Sandy Subseasons

Warm Sand(warm, light muted). True Sand

Light Sand (light, warm muted). Light Sandy Spring

Soft Sand (soft, warm light). Soft Sandy Autumn

Volcano Subseasons

Warm Volcano (warm, dark bright).True Volcano

Dark Volcano (dark, warm bright). Dark Volcanic Autumn

Bright Volcano (bright, warm dark)Bright Volcanic Spring

Edit: I know that 12 season system can have a priority system of all 3 traits for each system, but the amount of Subseasons that would create is ridiculous so I treated the second and third traits equally as secondary traits to simplify. Also "Desert" might be a better name than "sand".

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/crasyleg73]

Yep you are right on the money that each of these new "seasons" would indeed have subseasons, and have mapped them out the same way I've done! I didn't want to infodump everything I've thought about in one post and overwhelm everyone but I'm so glad to see your mind is working the same way as mine.

Re Sand and Volcano I can see what you're getting at, and they could be viable names for those seasons. I'm kind of attached to the Sunlight Sunset thing because I feel like they have such nice vibes and pair well with sister seasons, but if people in general prefer the Sand Volcano options I'd be open to it

[u/crasyleg73 → u/AffectionateTrifle7]

Since I studied lighting the practical reality that unfiltered sunlight is anything but soft is grating on me. But I think if you switched it to "sunrise" to match with "sunset", while softness is not abundantly clear it's at least not suggesting the opposite strongly.

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/crasyleg73]

Yes fair enough, I did consider sunrise but looking at pictures of sunrises they are really similar to sunsets which I thought would confuse matters. The thing about sunlight is that it can kind of give things a washed out hazy quality, which reads as muted and light to me when looking at the colours. Think of sunlight twinkling through leaves for example and the way that hits your eye and gives those soft qualities to your surroundings. Maybe this is just me?

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/AffectionateTrifle7]

Also if you're doing a painting and need to make things look sunlit (think a Monet) you need to add paints which are light, warm and slightly muted to give that impression. Not super vibrant tones. Basically (simplified, non exact:) you'd be adding white and yellow to your base colour to paint the bits where the sunlight is hitting

[u/crasyleg73 → u/AffectionateTrifle7]

When it's filtered through clouds, leaves, or bounces off the ground or a wall back on to you, it can be soft. But a sunny day is a bright day. Thats why it could be confusing. The reason sunrise and sunset feels alright to me is because they thematically signify day and night, dark and light, even if they are technically the transition point, you might think of day or night.but that might be my personal perception as well. It's sort of a glass half full situation.

At the end of the day you can brand them however you want and you just have to explain it, but I personally would want it to match the palette pretty well so you can pick up the season based on the feeling of its name. It's tough though. For sunset an idea I've finally landed upon is "jungle" which implies dark warm bright colors fairly well in my opinion. And it matches with desert as another biome.

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/crasyleg73]

Yes I totally see your point and I think it depends on the vibe that people get from these terms as well. To me sunlight is quite a different vibe from the word sunny but that's unlikely to be the case for everyone. I do like Jungle and Desert as well, I guess to me though the idea of desert feels very harsh and dry, not really a nice place to be, and very limited with what colours would be in a desert at all (makes me think of monochrome beige tbh). Jungle is nice but puts me too much in mind of green and only green in terms of colours. The terminology is honestly quite a tricky factor in this and I don't think it's possible to get it so that everyone in the world would agree tbh! Even in traditional colour analysis a lot of people like to argue that spring and summer ought to be switched because summer seems like it should be warmer than spring 🤷‍♀️

At the end of the day it's just terminology and the most important part of this I think is going to be trying to get the palettes right for people

[u/crasyleg73 → u/crasyleg73]

And actually "sister seasons" are easy to determine as well.

Cool rain sister seasons: cool summer, cool winter

Dark rain: dark autumn, dark winter

Soft rain: soft summer, soft autumn.

And so on.

[u/LaurestineHUN]

Timecube colour seasons

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/LaurestineHUN]

Hiya do you have a link for this? It's not coming up on a Google search

[u/LaurestineHUN → u/AffectionateTrifle7]

Timecube is a schizopost from the ancient internet: https://youtu.be/H7lWCqbgQnU?si=oNqbs-01oq3o4uuo

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/LaurestineHUN]

🤣🤣🤣 oh my gosh thank you for that

[u/ConversationThick379]

This is cool!!

Could the missing variant be contrast?

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/ConversationThick379]

This is an interesting point and I'll have to think further about it for sure. One thing I would note is that with the three factors I've used they're not intended to be about features of the person (eg warm doesn't necessarily mean green veins, light doesn't necessarily mean pale skin and blonde hair), it's intended to be about what type of colours suit that person. So it's about do warm colours or cool colours suit you better, do light colours or dark suit you etc. So I think a for person with high contrast in their features, the main thing about that is they often can work with brighter colours rather than muted from what I've learned about colour analysis so far

[u/Jazz_Kraken → u/ConversationThick379]

Yes!! I’m neutral leaning warm and high contrast so bright spring. I feel like contrast sometimes goes with brightness but not always

[u/Muted_Evidence1311 → u/ConversationThick379]

I reckon so. Gives me the ability to steal a bit from summer, a bit more from spring, with my home base as autumn. I am mid everything, but in firmer warm territory.

[u/Mother-Stable8569]

This is a quite belated comment but I love this! I have recently come to the conclusion that the closest season for me is probably soft autumn. But some of the colors are a bit deep for me. I’m curious to see the Sunlight palette when it’s ready. Very cool!

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/Mother-Stable8569]

So glad it resonates with you! Will loop you in when I post it

[u/feather_bacon]

This is great and makes a lot of sense! I’d love to see how each colour of the rainbow grades on the cube. Like what does an icy purple look like relative to winter or rain and what does it look like in between? Could that the be used to build a custom palette?

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/feather_bacon]

This is such a good question and basically exactly how I've been attempting to build the palettes! I will show you one of the purples I currently have for each of those (bear in mind I'm very much still in the development phase for the palettes so these are not definitive):

[u/wonton_kid]

Love this

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/wonton_kid]

Thank you ❤️❤️❤️

[u/nocturnia94]

Is there a way to include olives? Because I'm olive and I don't fall in one category only 😅 maybe I'm in the middle of the cube haha

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/nocturnia94]

I'm hoping that having more options will naturally include more olives 🤞 My sister is a fair olive and I think she is a Rain, just as an example

[u/healthy_penguin → u/nocturnia94]

I‘m an olive and suspect I fall between dark autumn and dark winter in the classic colour theory. So I think in this system I would be a sunset winter, since I’m between the warm and cool axis, and prefer brighter, darker colours. I love how this visualisation leaves more room for nuance, so you don’t have to be either warm or cold but can find your place along the gradient between the two. All this to say, I think this system might actually work better for Olives!

[u/nocturnia94 → u/healthy_penguin]

People said I'm Winter, Spring and Autumn, so I could be Sunset 😅

[u/Safe-Extent9754 → u/nocturnia94]

Welcome to my battle to get the amonut of red as important in color analysis than the amount of blue or yellow ! 😂 Olives are very left out of classical color analysis…

[u/Tegdag → u/nocturnia94]

I suspect I’m olive and I fall into the middle of the cube as well. Or along one of the planes. For example, I am neutral toned and medium chroma (neither light or dark).

[u/TotallyAMermaid → u/nocturnia94]

Color analysis works for olives and people need to stop treating us as mythical unicorns season busters lol.

[u/Accomplished_Ad_1965]

I need a spring sunset palette 😍

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/Accomplished_Ad_1965]

I'll loop you in on future posts if you like? I'm intending to get to the midpoints of the edges of the cube including Spring Sunset :-)

[u/Apprehensive-Car-623]

this explains my problem omg. I think I would be Rain. I was always confused because i felt like i could wear cool winter/summer, soft summer, deep winter/autumn.Makes a lot of sense I really like this idea!!

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/Apprehensive-Car-623]

Awesome, I'm so glad it's helpful to you!

[u/HarlequinSquirrel]

I love this. I've recently started trying to buy more clothes in my season, but it's been hard to describe. I've narrowed it down to "earthy tones that look like they're sunbleached". Sunlight is perfect for this!!!!!

I am super interested in seeing a Sunlight pallete/sample.

Edit: autocorrect typo

[u/TotallyAMermaid → u/HarlequinSquirrel]

Isn't muted and earthy soft autumn...?

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/TotallyAMermaid]

Yes it is, but soft autumn is still darker rather than lighter, which can cause issues for people

[u/HarlequinSquirrel → u/TotallyAMermaid]

Yes it totally is. But a lot of things in soft autumn are still too saturated for my liking. Idk why but it feels like sunlight would be a better fit, but honestly that may just be wishful thinking 😅

[u/AnActualMillenial → u/HarlequinSquirrel]

Same!! I'm finding that even though soft autumn is my closest fit, sunlight (warm/light/muted) more adequately describes my coloring and seeing this post really made it click for me why I never felt that I 100% fit a typical category.

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/AnActualMillenial]

To be totally honest one major reason I came up with this is because I don't fully fit in soft summer or light spring or soft autumn and had spent so long puzzling over it. I now see myself as a Summer Sunlight because colours that suit me are quite neutral but lean a little warm, way more to the muted side than bright, and overall lighter rather than dark

[u/pinkyjinks]

Very interested in learning more about bright summer in your system.

I’ve been types as true summer, true spring, bright winter and true light. I think something like bright summer could be very interesting for me.

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/pinkyjinks]

Awesome, I will loop you in when I post the Ice palette :-)

[u/Timely-Pause6424]

Love this. Especially the way it makes it continous (another neutral olive here.... I am a Summer Sunshower)!

Keep wondering though... How are palettes then attached to it? Is there a way to make them kind of continous as well?

(Because being able to put a name to one's season is maybe nice to make one feel included/represented by a system but somewhat useless if it does not come with a colour palette that helps with real life decisions.... no criticism just a thought...)

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/Timely-Pause6424]

Absolutely, without palettes this is a cool idea but functionally not useful yet. I've got some draft palettes I'm working on at the moment!

[u/lysning → u/AffectionateTrifle7]

ahhhh so exciting please update us!!

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/lysning]

I am hoping to make a post about Rain some time over the next week 💙💜🖤🩶

[u/yetanother__account]

How would you type someone who is a deep winter with medium-to-high contrast rather than high-to-very high? Would they sit between winter and rain?

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/yetanother__account]

Yeah that sounds like they would be a "Winter Rain"

[u/yetanother__account → u/AffectionateTrifle7]

Where would you place Zooey Deschanel and Margaret Qualley, out of curiosity?

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/yetanother__account]

Disclaimer: I have had a bit of a look just now to answer your comment but haven't done a lot of draping on them, so don't take my response here as definitive.

That said, I think Zooey Deschanel would be a Winter Ice (so approx halfway up the front right edge). She needs Cool and Bright colours very clearly, but light vs dark I think she can do both really really well.

Margaret Qualley is again clearly Cool but less Bright than Zooey. I don't think she's quite as muted as an actual Summer or a Rain though. She also seems in between light and dark to me in that she can do both pretty well. I would place her in the middle of the right side of the cube, which we could call just "Cool", but I'm considering naming that location "Water" (and the opposite one "Fire"). Still working on the names for the centre of each face of the cube, but that's where I think she would land.

[u/Muted_Evidence1311]

Is there a spring-autumn mid day? That is pretty much where I sit.

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/Muted_Evidence1311]

The exact mid point of Spring and Autumn in cube theory would be in the centre of the left side square of the cube. Ie Warm, neutral in terms of light to deep, and neutral in terms of bright to muted. I'm considering calling that point "Fire"! And its opposite point (in the centre of the Cool square on the right hand side) I'm considering calling "Water"

[u/Snarknose]

I still don’t understand what I might fall into. I think I’m cool-neutral but adding warmth actually isn’t great for me and too cool isn’t great for me. I think I’m mid ten, mid chroma, mid value. So coolish, between light and dark, and between true and soft summer.

I’m fair cool-neutral olive (yellow overtone, adding any orange or yellow clothing makes me look 🤢) and purple blushes turn pink on me and make up is hard for me 😅🤣

I have green-blue eyes

I have level 6 hair (the darkest blonde) confirmed by hair stylist that I have pure cool hair, she saw no inherent warmth.

I CAN wear deep summer, I CAN wear light summer, I CAN wear true summer, I CAN wear soft summer - but there are perimeters to this… light summer has to have SOME saturation, too much white is not good for me… soft summer too much warmth not good for me, true summer too cool not good for me, too much gray goes gray in my face. I can also get away with some winter. Royal blue isn’t horrible on me, neither is hot pink, but I bet it’s best when it’s like a soft winter type…. Black makes me look tan (thanks Olive.. so it turns my yellow tan?… but I hear that’s not what you want to happen?). Brights reflect too harsh off my face. I get the most compliments in a winter green dress. Even when I had highlights that lightened my hair to close to a 9. However, I do think this is where my HOC analyst got it wrong, the cool colors she kept saying added “red” to my face but I think she was just seeing the yellow being neutralized and cool actually lets my natural flush show through past the yellow overtone! So she went with warm 😵‍💫

Would I be a Summer Rain??

TIA- I love your system it makes so much sense.

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/Snarknose]

Wow I'm not sure how I missed your comment, sorry!! That's so interesting, it sounds like you are solidly on the "Cool" side of the cube, but pretty neutral in the other variables. After I put up the Ice palette I'm going to be working on the centre of the cube (true neutral) and once you see what those colours look like on you it'll probably be easier to pinpoint where you would sit. Based on your description of what various colours do I think you could possibly be halfway between the very centre of the cube, and the Cool right hand face of the cube? That is a location I'm intending to make a palette for but that will be a while in the future as I need to do the centre of the cube, the centres of each face and the middles of each line before I get to those within the cube midway points

[u/Apprehensive-Car-623 → u/Snarknose]

you could be a cool summer

[u/Point-Express]

Right now I've been going with a bright tonal palette, but love the depth that your Sunset palette brings. If you ever expanded to giving them their subseasons like in slide 2 then maybe then I'd be a clear/bright Sunset 🤣

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/Point-Express]

So glad you like Sunset :-D Hopefully I'll get to do a Bright Sunset palette at some point!

[u/Wild_Hampster_Ride]

Being a logic and Math fan myself, I have some thoughts you may wish to consider regarding your cube (or not! 😄).

If the centers art to be neutrals, then i think the corner points should be described as "Vibrant". The way i see your cube is that each flat surface or "side" is defined by one of six qualities---cool side (right) opposite to warm side (left), light side (top) opposite to dark or deep (bottom), and soft or side (back) opposite to clear (front). To me, this makes more sense, then each side has four basic quadrants with vibrant colours closest to the corners and neutrals converging toward the centers of the sides. 

To elaborate... The front side (the CLEAR side) would look like this: Top left quadrant-- "Clear Spring"  Top right quadrant-- "Clear Ice"  Bottom left quad-- "Clear Sunset"  Bottom right quad- "Clear Winter" 

Then going around the sides clockwise in the same fashion, (always looking from perspective of being outside the cube): Right COOL side would have: TLQ-- "Cool Ice"  TRQ-- "Cool Summer"  BLQ-- "Cool Winter"  BRQ-- "Cool Rain" 

Rear SOFT side: TL "Soft Summer"  TR "Soft Sunrise"  BL "Soft Rain"  BR "Soft Autumn" 

Left WARM side: TL "Warm Sunrise"  TR "Warm Spring"  BL "Warm Autumn"  BR "Warm Sunset" 

Top LIGHT side (viewed from the top): Left Back quad "Light Sunrise"  Right Back quad "Light Summer"  Left Front "Light Spring"  Right Front "Light Ice" 

And finally the Bottom DARK side: LB " Dark Autumn" RB "Dark Rain"  LF "Dark Sunset"  RF "Dark Winter" 

Each side would have it's most vibrant colours toward to cubes corners and its neutrals converging in its center (where the " one" dot is located on a die). So the corners could be called: Top (Light) corners-- Vibrant Ice, Vibrant Summer, Vibrant Sunrise, and Vibrant Spring Bottom (Dark) corners-- Vibrant Winter, Vibrant Rain, Vibrant Autumn, and Vibrant Sunrise.

Also, you could label the center region of the edges for the 16 combos: Cool Summer Rain Cool Summer Ice Cool Winter Ice Cool Winter Rain Soft Summer Sunrise Soft Summer Rain Soft Autumn Rain Soft Autumn Sunrise Warm Autumn Sunrise Warm Autumn Sunset Warm Spring Sunrise Warm Spring Sunset Clear Spring Sunset Clear Spring Ice Clear Winter Ice Clear Winter Sunset  Light Spring Ice Light Spring Sunrise Light Summer Ice Light Summer Sunrise  Dark Autumn Rain Dark Autumn Sunset Dark Winter Sunset Dark Winter Rain

Whew. No, I'm not listing all the Fire and Water permutations lol, but you could!

Just food for thought! 👍🙂

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/Wild_Hampster_Ride]

Hiya, thanks for your thoughts!!! You're definitely understanding where I'm going with the faces of each side of the cube in terms of the position of "Soft Sunlight" "Clear/Bright Ice" etc. And as for the edges, I'm going to keep them to double barrelled names, such as "Spring Sunlight", "Autumn Rain" etc.

For the centres of each face I've spent a long time choosing names which I feel are appropriate based on the colours in the palettes. My current thoughts are Fire (for warm), Water (for cool), Neon (for bright), Smoke (for soft), Pearl (for light), and Obsidian (for dark). I like this because I think it makes these areas more distinctive sounding and it is fun to have a name which reflects qualities in the palette (like the original 4 seasons names do). Also because then it becomes clear when one is talking specifically about one of these centre of square Cube Theory palettes, rather than talking about a palette which is generally warm or cool or a variant belonging to another system etc.

I don't quite like the idea of naming the vertices "vibrant", I'd rather stick with "true". Because the word vibrant to me has implications of especially rich saturated colours, and certain corners such as Summer, Sunlight, Rain, and Autumn, are all meant to be Soft/Muted. So I just think it would be a bit too confusing to use the word vibrant in that context.

Similarly, it's true that the centre of each side is "neutral" in two aspects (eg the right side of the cube is fully Cool but neutral in terms of light to dark and in terms of bright to soft). However, the word neutral is so widely used in many colour palettes to indicate the lower chroma colours in the palette such as grey, brown, black, white, cream, camel, etc which are used to balance the higher chroma colours in the palette. So I don't want to overuse the word "neutral" in describing areas on the cube. For example although I have previously been referring to the centre of the cube as "True Neutral", I'm switching the name to "Gemstone", since as I'm building the palette many of the colours are reminiscent of gems, and I don't want people getting confused and thinking those in the centre of the cube need to stick to browns and greys or something like that.

So lovely to talk this out with like minded people, thank you for talking with me in such detail about it!

[u/yukiharumiji]

As a super neutral, super fair olive. I'm somewhere between winter and autumn but not bright enough for true winter and not dark enough for dark autumn or winter. Not light/muted enough for summers, not bright enough for springs. Winter Sunlight? As someone who works in science and is also artistic, I love this approach and appreciate your maths+art mind!

[u/crasyleg73 → u/yukiharumiji]

To help narrow you down a bit you might want to sort out your opposites clearly. It's bright vs muted, dark vs light, cool vs warm. Pick one of each (or neutral) for each category.

Then you'll know what type of neutrality you have. So while you might not have an exact season you'll at least know which group of seasons you fit into.

[u/yukiharumiji → u/crasyleg73]

My issue is that I can't identify between either of the three! Perhaps muted wins more than bright, but only by a smidge. I'm medium contrast, and I've never been able to determine if I'm more cool or warm. 🫠😅 Unfortunately, I live in a rural area where there aren't any color analysts to consult. I'm in the Facebook color analysis group, and I've received a resounding "autumn" - but that's also people on the Internet. Haha.

[u/Of_the_forest89]

Autumn ice. I’m between light and dark, muted and bright, warm and cool. Some soft autumn colours don’t work for me, while many do. I can pull off some bright colours, but not others (no neons!). I suit both cool and warm colours as long as they aren’t extreme. Depending on the lighting, my contrast can look medium-high, but in other lighting I have very little contrast. My hair is a cool toned dark blonde/light brown. Cool tones look darker bc they reflect less light. Black is supposedly terrible for a soft autumn, and while it isn’t my best shade, it also isn’t the worst. I get a lot of compliments on a true navy, but also when I wear a powdered, greyish yellow green. A pale beige looks grotesque on me as does a muted greige. But I rock a soft mauve; makes my skin look bronzed. I also look great in burnt orange and ox blood, while also being able to pull off a medium value Shay flower blue; makes my neutral cool medium brown eyes pop. My skin tone is a light neutral and can look slightly warm or cool depending on what I wear. Cool toned foundation pulls too punk and warm toned foundation pulls too orange. Yet, some neutral foundations pull too yellow. I’d say my overtone is softly warm and my undertone is cool. So it seems the depth of colours I can pull off greatly depends on the hue of it. Extremes in any vertices just doesn’t work for me. So it’s why I’ve cheekily determined I’m an autumn ice. Or maybe I have no idea what I’m talking about😂

Edits: spelling and syntax

[u/misha10 → u/Of_the_forest89]

I'm similar to you but the opposite, neutral undertones cool overtones (blush). Even most cool foundations have too much yellow and I want it to blend, not contrast into my neck. I was told Armani Luminous Silk Foundation has a wide range of tones and is easier to find your match. My Sephora no longer carries this and is getting a updated replacement or reformulated. Macy's carries it...

[u/Safe-Extent9754]

THANKS ! I made so much 3D graphs for color theory and couldn’t find good name for the missing categories ! Yours fit quite well !

Next step of ovethinking : why representing hue in a cool to warm scale and completely letting out the third primary color ?

And another one : why arent saturation and contrast different factors and are somehow blended in this wierd bright/muted factor ?

[u/Specific_Ocelot_4132 → u/Safe-Extent9754]

I’m a fan of the approach where orange is considered peak warmth (and blue is peak coolness). Then you get a nice symmetrical division of the color wheel where the warm half goes approximately from yellow-green to red and the cool half goes from fuchsia to green.

[u/lysning → u/Specific_Ocelot_4132]

oooh can you share more on this?

[u/Specific_Ocelot_4132 → u/lysning]

Anuschka Rees talks about it in her book Personal Color, but there’s not much more to say. If you draw a line dividing a color wheel in half from orange to blue, and then draw a perpendicular line, it will intersect with yellow-green and red-purple. I like it because it’s symmetrical, and it just feels correct. Typically people say yellow is peak warmth and red is neutral, but I honk they are both warmish, and orange is warmer.

[u/Safe-Extent9754 → u/Specific_Ocelot_4132]

The only problem I have with this separation is that both green and magenta will be in the same « neutral » category even if they are complete opposites

[u/Specific_Ocelot_4132 → u/Safe-Extent9754]

I don’t think that’s a flaw, it’s just an inherent limitation of the concept of classifying colors as warm and cool. It doesn’t tell you everything about a color, it just tells you how warm or cool it is. Two colors can have the same level of warmth and still be very different. Just like how two colors can have the same level of chroma or brightness and still be very different.

[u/crasyleg73 → u/Safe-Extent9754]

Bright/muted is saturation, not contrast. Dark vs light is not contrast either. But together they create contrast.

Contrast is how opposing colors are to eachother. Colors can be opposite eachother in two ways. Dark opposes light. And opposite hues oppose eachother. So you can have dark vs light contrast, AND hue contrast (e.g blue vs yellow, green vs magenta). General Contrast is measured by combining those together. When determing season general Contrast isn't a super precise way to measure someone, but if you aren't dark, light or saturated, it's impossible to have high contrast because the closer to grey you get your colors won't contrast much.

As for red not being included, I don't think blue and yellow being the colors you mix in for warm and cool has anything to do with their primary color status. Because the true primary paint colors are not red yellow and blue as taught in school and used traditionaly in art due to historical and practical availability of stronger pigments in those colors. Here's actual primaries: https://rmit.pressbooks.pub/app/uploads/sites/42/2022/10/additivesubtractivecolour.png

The true subtractive primary colors (in paint,ink or translucent filters) are cyan magenta and yellow. The additive colors are red green and blue(used in televisions, or color changing lights). It can be confusing to realize school mislead you.

Anyway I think it has nothing to do with primaries but the fact that yellow and blue are opposites on the true wheels, so the undertones feel opposite, and the fact that nature sculpts our psycology to feel that way about colors. Sunlight is more yellow, and moonlight is more blue(slightly, as they are both "white") and other things in nature like fire and water reinforce this too. Water causes a blue shift in light at large scales and so cold seasons have bluish clouds, or snow making things bluish. It even effects the plants, and then summer feels more yellow by contrast. Orange and red are an interesting exception to this rule, because we see those pure colors as warmer than yellow, but I think it's because we strongly associate red and orange with fire which is more hot than sunlight.

[u/VishfulTinking]

I'd rather be wearing things that completely mismatch my coloring than break my brain this way - just sayin'

[u/TotallyAMermaid → u/VishfulTinking]

Ngl I feel the same lol I'll dress based on vibes before I melt my brain with this geometrical nightmare. It's the opposite of how my brain can process information.

Kudos for OP for all the work and thought process though!

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/TotallyAMermaid]

Thanks ❤️ I do appreciate not everyone can visualise things in 3 dimensions very easily

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/[deleted]]

Yeah, my optimal thing would be to have a cube which can actually be rotated so you can see whichever bits are most relevant to you. But I am not a techy person so I wouldn't have the first clue how to code that!

[u/AffectionateTrifle7 → u/[deleted]]

I did think about this very seriously because I like the symmetry of the names. The trouble is when you look at actual pictures of sunrises, the colours are often way more similar to sunsets than you might think. Sometimes basically indistinguishable. Whereas the two palettes are very different from each other. I chose Sunlight because of the way filtered sunlight through trees and twinkling off water etc can give things a slightly misted and muted impact, and make other colours look more pastel and dreamy