Funny you say that, I’m actually a tetrachromat, which means I’m the opposite of colorblind. The purple skittles just didn’t seem purple. They chose such a drab shade of purple that, even to me (or even especially to me), rather than being recognizable as the same vibrant color as grapes, it appears to be the kind of purple you get from the sky on an exceptionally rainy droopy day.
It also helped that, after looking at such a drab sky, I ended up seeing the rainbow, thinking back to the skittles commercial, seeing what colors were actually in the rainbow, and thinking “wait a minute…”
It’s actually the same exact gene as the colorblindness gene, except it manifests as tetrachromacy in females while manifesting as colorblindness in males. If you have any colorblind people in your family, chances are you also have tetrachromats in your family too.
It’s a rather double-edged sword, especially as an artist. For example, you lose a little of your natural appreciation of differing shades, and it doesn’t transfer over to technology, so a picture of a bird you see on a device is going to have less color than the same bird if it were right in front of you. Personally I could do without the extra colors.
I thought the “purple” skittles were supposed to be brown (I still think they look brown). One day I looked on the package. The rest is history.
Ever done a color blindness test?
Funny you say that, I’m actually a tetrachromat, which means I’m the opposite of colorblind. The purple skittles just didn’t seem purple. They chose such a drab shade of purple that, even to me (or even especially to me), rather than being recognizable as the same vibrant color as grapes, it appears to be the kind of purple you get from the sky on an exceptionally rainy droopy day.
It also helped that, after looking at such a drab sky, I ended up seeing the rainbow, thinking back to the skittles commercial, seeing what colors were actually in the rainbow, and thinking “wait a minute…”
TIL Tetrachromacy exists in humans.
It’s actually the same exact gene as the colorblindness gene, except it manifests as tetrachromacy in females while manifesting as colorblindness in males. If you have any colorblind people in your family, chances are you also have tetrachromats in your family too.
It’s a rather double-edged sword, especially as an artist. For example, you lose a little of your natural appreciation of differing shades, and it doesn’t transfer over to technology, so a picture of a bird you see on a device is going to have less color than the same bird if it were right in front of you. Personally I could do without the extra colors.