Can light be a “Brown” color? If not, why not?
This is one of my favorite questions. The short answer is “no”. Brown cannot be perceived as a light source because it is only perceived as a related color that is “dark” and “low in chroma”. This can only occur for colors that are less luminous than the white we are adapting to. Here is some more detail from one of my other websites. Q: What is brown? A: Brown is dark, low-chroma (desaturated), orange. In other words, an orange light that is perceived in an environment that makes it look dark and less saturated will appear brown. A brighter surround is such an environment. Brown is a special sort of color perception that requires this relationship to its environment in order to be perceived. That’s why you can’t go to a hardware store and buy a brown light bulb!
