Color Mixing - Subtractive Mixing

Subtractive Mixing

Subtractive mixing is done by selectively removing certain colors, for instance with optical filters. The three primary colors in subtractive mixing are yellow, magenta, and cyan. In subtractive mixing of color, the absence of color is white and the presence of all three primary colors is black. In subtractive mixing of colors, the secondary colors are the same as the primary colors from additive mixing, and vice versa. Subtractive mixing is used to create a variety of colors when printing on paper by combining a small number of ink colors, and also when painting. The mixing of pigments does not produce perfect subtractive color mixing because some light from the subtracted color is still being reflected. This results in a darker and desaturated color compared to the color that would be achieved with ideal filters.