Why does the colour red (on everything) loses its “colour structural integrity) much sooner than other darker colours like, say, green, blue and black?
In: Chemistry
The color you see is the result of pigments absorbing and reflecting certain wavelengths. Red things are red because they are reflecting (not absorbing) long-wavelength light and absorbing light with shorter wavelengths.
Wavelength is inversely proportional to energy. The more energy the light has, the shorter its wavelength will be (and the higher its frequency will be). Very short wavelengths beyond the visible blue and violet part of the spectrum (the *ultra*violet) have enough energy to energize electrons so much that they fly away from their atomic nuclei. This is called *ionizing radiation*.
Red things are red because they are absorbing all that low-wavelength, high-energy light at the other end of the visible part of the spectrum. Blue, on the other hand, is reflecting all that high-energy light and absorbing the lower-energy red light. As a result, red pigments are absorbing more ionizing radiation than any other pigment, while blue is absorbing the least amount.
Black is, of course, absorbing *all* visible wavelengths, so it will also degrade quickly. That said, it’s harder for you to notice black fading from “not very much light being reflected at all” to “a little bit more light than before”. It’ll still be black, just less black.
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