With prime colors blue and red makes violet, but when light is split with a prism it makes secondary colors between prime ones, except violet is on the very end and not in contact with red light, only blue. Why is this?

Question

With prime colors blue and red makes violet, but when light is split with a prism it makes secondary colors between prime ones, except violet is on the very end and not in contact with red light, only blue. Why is this?

In: Physics

Answer 1

Hi 🙂

Our eyes have three types of color receptors for red, green and blue. (And some for just brightness.) Kind of like printers make up all the colors mixing ink / combining ink dots close next to each other.

But it’s not as simple as that. The receptors for red are also a bit sensitive in the other range.

When the receptors for red and blue detect something, but not the receptors for green, our brain perceives violet.