An Investigation of Colour Appearance for

Unrelated Colours Under Photopic and

Mesopic Vision

Chenyang Fu,1 Changjun Li,2 Guihua Cui,1

M. Ronnier Luo,1* Robert W. G. Hunt,1 Michael R. Pointer1
1
Colour, Imaging and Design Research Centre, University of Leeds, United Kingdom

2
School of Electronic and Information Engineering, University of Science and Technology Liaoning, China

Received 13 July 2010; revised 17 December 2010; accepted 30 December 2010

Abstract: Data were obtained for the colour appearance INTRODUCTION

of unrelated colours under photopic and mesopic condi-
Every day, we are surrounded by an environment of
tions. The effects of changes in luminance level and stim-
objects, and their colour is one of the important ways of
ulus size were investigated. The method used was magni-
identifying them. Colour perception can occur as a result
tude scaling of brightness, colourfulness, and hue. Two
either of single stimuli or of combinations of stimuli. In
stimulus sizes (108 and 0.58) and four starting luminance
the real world, objects are normally viewed in a complex
levels (60, 5, 1, and 0.1, cd/m2) were used. The results at
context of many stimuli; they are known as ‘related’ col-
0.1 cd/m2 had large variations, so data were obtained for
ours. An ‘unrelated colour’ is perceived by itself, and is
two additional stimulus sizes (18 and 28) at this luminance
isolated, either completely or partially, from any other
level. Ten observers judged 50 unrelated colours. A total
colours.1–3 Typical examples of unrelated colours are sig-
of 17,820 estimations were made. The observations were
nal lights, traffic lights, and street lights, viewed on a dark
carried out in a completely darkened room, after 20 min
night. These colours are important in connection with
adaptation; each test colour was presented on its own.
safety issues (such as night driving). To consider these
Brightness and colourfulness were found to decrease with
issues, some questions need to be answered. What is the
decreases of both luminance level and stimulus size. The
most efficient lighting for early recognition of obstacles
CAM97u model predicted brightness more accurately than
when vehicles are on unlit public roads at night? When
CIECAM02 but gave worse performance in predicting col-
an aircraft is travelling at night, how can pilots best detect
orfulness. For hue, CAM97u and CIECAM02 both gave
signal lights? What particular colour should pedestrians
satisfactory predictions. Using the brightness correlate
select to wear as clothing when they are on a road at
from CAM97u, a new colour-appearance model based on
night? The above questions are related to the visual per-
CIECAM02 was developed specifically for unrelated col-
formance involving unrelated colours seen against a dark
ours under photopic and mesopic conditions, with parame-
field. Hence, it is highly desired to accumulate colour-
ters to allow for the effects of luminance level and stimulus
appearance data for unrelated colours under surround con-
size.
2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Col Res Appl, 00, 000 – 000, 2011;
ditions of low luminances.
Published online in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com). DOI
The human eye has two kinds of retinal photoreceptors,
10.1002/col.20691
rods and cones.1 They are not uniformly distributed on
Key words: unrelated colour; photopic vision; mesopic the retina. Inside the foveola (the central 18 field of the
vision; CAM97u; CIECAM02 eye), there are only cones; outside, there are both cones
and rods; in the area beyond about 408 from the visual
axis, there are nearly all rods and very few cones. The
rods provide monochromatic vision under low luminance
*Correspondence to: M. Ronnier Luo (e-mail: m.r.luo@leeds.ac.uk).
levels; this scotopic vision is in operation when only rods
are active, and this occurs when the luminance level is
V
C 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. less than some hundredths of a cd/m2. Between this level

Volume 00, Number 0, Month 2011 1

 It should be noted that there are some cases, such as
when two colours are displayed against a black surround
field, which could be in between related and unrelated
colours. These situations can be of practical importance
but are difficult to categorise clearly; they are not
included in this investigation.

EXPERIMENTAL CONDITIONS
A CRT monitor with a 24-bit graphic card was used to
display colour stimuli. Its peak white was set to have the
chromaticity coordinates of CIE Illuminant D65 with a
luminance of 60 cd/m2. The CRT monitor was carefully
characterized using the GOG (gain-offset-gamma)
model.15 The GOG model was used to transform between
FIG. 1. The u’, v’ chromaticities of the 50 colours tristimulus values and RGB digital signals of the display.
selected for investigation. The model was tested using 108 test colours. Colour dif-
and a few cd/m2, vision involves a mixture of rod and ference was calculated between the measured and the
cone activities, which is referred to as mesopic vision.1 It original tristimulus values. A mean DE*ab value of 0.46
requires luminances of at least several cd/m2 for photopic was obtained, indicating a good accuracy of the character-
vision in which only cones are active. ization model.
A model for predicting the colour appearance of related
colours in mesopic, photopic and scotopic vision was pro-
Test Colours
posed by Shin et al.4 This model was built based on their
earlier studies5 in which a haploscopic colour-matching Fifty test colour stimuli were selected to cover a wide
technique was used. The observers were asked to match colour gamut; their chromaticities are shown in Fig. 1.
colours between a test colour chip under various illumi- The SPDs of test colours are shown in Fig. 2.
nance levels and a stimulus presented on a CRT display
under photopic luminance conditions. Another study by
Eloholma and Halonen,6 used a visual task-performance Stimulus Size and Luminance Level
approach. Spectral sensitivity functions were defined for The colours were displayed to cover the full CRT
the luminance range of 0.01 to 10 cd/m2, with particular screen in a darkened room. A piece of black cardboard
reference to night-time driving performance. In another with a hole in the middle was used to mask most of the
study, Kwak7 used related colours with 28 and 108 view- screen. Neutral density filters were used to cover the hole
ing fields under mesopic vision and concluded that it is in the middle to achieving the desired luminance levels.
insufficient to predict colour appearance simply using dif- Figure 3 illustrates the whole viewing field which was
ferent colour matching functions. None of the above stud- seen in a completely dark room. Each colour was meas-
ies was dedicated to the appearance of unrelated colours. ured using a Minolta CS1000 tele-spectroradiometer
New data on unrelated colours is therefore required for (TSR) to obtain its luminance and tristimulus values.
predicting their appearance.
In this investigation,8 only unrelated colours were studied.
Different sizes of stimuli were used in photopic and mesopic
conditions. The results accumulated were used to test some
colour appearance models. Almost all these models, includ-
ing the current CIECAM02 model,9–11 were developed to
consider only related colours.3,12,13 Hunt14 developed a
model to predict the colour appearance for both related and
unrelated colours in different viewing conditions. At a later
stage, he refined the original model to be used for unrelated
colours, known as CAM97u2. However, there has been little
data available to verify the performance of this model.
The aims of this study were: to investigate how the
luminance and size of stimuli affects colour appearance
for unrelated colours under photopic and mesopic vision;
to study how the colour appearance models, CAM97u and
CIECAM02, perform with the visual data; and to develop
a new model for unrelated colours. FIG. 2. The SPD of the 50 colours selected for investigation.

2 COLOR research and application

 Table I summarizes the viewing conditions in the 10
phases studied. The required luminance levels were
reached using three neutral density filters (named 1, 2 and
3 in Table I) to cover the test colours. No filter was used
for the two phases (1 and 4) having a D65 luminance
level of 60 cd/m2. In this case, the filter was named as
‘‘0.’’ The name of each phase is composed of two parts.
The first part describes the D65 luminance level, i.e., 60,
5, 1, or 0.1 cd/m2. The second part represents the size of
the field in degrees, i.e., 108 or 0.58. For example, 60-0.5
denotes a D65 luminance level of 60 cd/m2 with a 0.58
stimulus.
The TSR was used to measure the test stimuli with or
without different filters. In the case of the experiments
FIG. 3. The experimental viewing field.
using Filter 3, the luminance levels of most of the test
colours were too low to be measured using the TSR.
Hence an indirect method was applied to calculate the
To investigate mesopic vision, a 108 visual angle for
tristimulus values of those phases. The spectral power dis-
stimuli was selected, because this includes a region of the
tribution of the test stimuli without any filter was first
retina surrounding the foveola that contains both cones
measured. After that, the tristimulus values of the test col-
and rods; this made it possible to study the effects of rod-
ours with filters were calculated based on Eq. (1) given
intrusion. On the other hand, in realistic situations, traffic
below.
lights (which are typical examples of unrelated colours)
are usually seen at a long distance from the observer. For X
780

example, airplane pilots look at signal lights which are far X ¼ 6833 pðkÞ
ðTðkÞ=100Þ
xðkÞ
Dk (1)
380
away from them at a small visual angle; therefore, a 0.58
visual angle for stimuli was also used. where p(k): Spectral radiance measurement data W/
To investigate the changes in colour appearance for dif- (sr
m2
nm) T(k): Transmittance of the filter (%)
ferent luminance levels, the same test colours with differ- TðkÞ ¼ 100Ti0 ðkÞ=TW;i
0
ðkÞ (2)
ent stimulus sizes were assessed under four different
luminance levels covering both photopic and mesopic where Ti’(k) is the spectral transmittance of the sample
vision conditions. These levels corresponded to the D65 with filter i and TWi’(k) is the spectral transmittance of
stimulus having luminances of 60, 5, 1, and 0.1 cd/m2, a the peak white with filter i. The tristimulus values Y and
range of 2.77 log units. The range of luminances between Z were computed similarly.
the test colours were 2.0 to 60 cd/m2, 0.27 to 5.09 cd/m2,
0.09 to 1.03 cd/m2, and 0.013 to 0.104 cd/m2 for each of
the four luminance levels. The same batch of test colours Experimental Procedures
was used for all of the phases.
Psychophysical experiments were conducted to obtain
Because the experimental results showed that a large
visual data by a panel of 10 observers (4 females, 6
reduction in colourfulness occurred under low luminance
males) using the magnitude-estimation method.16 Each
levels, especially for smaller stimulus sizes, an additional
colour was assessed in terms of brightness, colourfulness,
two stimulus sizes, 28 and 18, were included to investigate
and hue. No reference white was displayed. The terms
further stimuli at different stimulus sizes under the lowest
lightness and chroma are relative perceptual attributes of
luminance level (0.1 cd/m2). The viewing conditions stud-
colours, and these two attributes do not apply to unrelated
ied were divided into two groups. Group 1 included two
colours, because they do not have a similarly illuminated
stimulus sizes (108 and 0.58) under three luminance levels
(60, 5, and 1 cd/m2) for investigating the changes in col-
our appearance of colours caused by different stimulus TABLE I. Experimental phases in the study.
sizes and different luminance levels. Group 2 included Luminance of Filter Visual angle
four stimulus sizes (108, 28, 18, and 0.58) under a lumi- Phase Name D65 (cd/m2) name of stimuli
nance level of 0.1 cd/m2 to further investigate the colour
Group 1 1 60–0.5 60 0 0.58
appearance of different stimulus sizes under a low lumi- 2 5–0.5 5 1
nance level. 3 1–0.5 1 2
4 60–10 60 0 108
5 5–10 5 1
6 1–10 1 2
Filters Group 2 7 0.1–0.5 0.1 3 0.58
8 0.1–1 18
The four different luminance levels were obtained by 9 0.1–2 28
using neutral density filters over the monitor. 10 0.1–10 108

Volume 00, Number 0, Month 2011 3

area that appears white. Thus unrelated colours only ex- TABLE II. Observer variation of 10 phases in terms
hibit the perceptual attributes of brightness, colourfulness, of CV values.
saturation, and hue. A sample having a colourfulness of
Accuracy Repeatability
40 and a brightness of 100 was assigned as an anchor col-
Phase Name B M H B M H
our for scaling these two attributes. Observers were
required to memorize this reference colour viewed in a 1 60–0.5 28 48 13 15 26 5
viewing cabinet before conducting the experiment. 2 5–0.5 34 48 15 16 27 5
3 1–0.5 40 44 13 20 29 9
The magnitude-estimation method requires observers to 4 60–10 29 39 15 15 21 6
estimate the scale values of various colour-appearance 5 5–10 36 43 15 18 17 4
attributes such as lightness, brightness, colourfulness, hue 6 1–10 38 37 17 15 27 7
7 0.1–0.5 78 82 19 39 57 11
or the reproduction quality. Observers are asked to scale 8 0.1–1 79 78 18 24 43 9
the stimulus by assigning a number which is proportional 9 0.1–2 61 72 14 32 41 7
to the magnitude of the chosen attribute. 10 0.1–10 55 68 14 27 37 9
Mean 48 56 15 22 32 8
Hue is an attribute of a visual sensation according to
which an area appears to be similar to one, or to propor-
tions of two, of the perceived colours red, yellow, green The repeatability of the magnitude-scaling by the
and blue. Observers were asked to describe a hue as a observers was also analyzed by randomly selecting 10 test
proportion of two neighboring primaries. They need to colours and having each observer match them three times.
decide which of the four primaries is predominant. Next The results for observer accuracy and repeatability are
decide whether or not to observe a trace of any other pri- summarized in Table II in terms of mean CV values for
mary hue. If so, identify it. Finally, estimate the propor- brightness (B), colourfulness (M), and hue (H).
tions in which the two primaries stand, e.g., an orange The results show that the mean CV values for observer
colour may have 60% red and 40% yellow. The score 0, accuracy 48, 56, 15, and for repeatability are 22, 32, 8,
100, 200, 300 and 400 correspond to unique red, yellow, for brightness, colourfulness and hue, respectively. This
green, blue and red, respectively. implies that for assessing colour appearance under these
The observations were carried out in a totally dark unrelated viewing conditions, observer repeatability per-
environment. It is important that observers are fully dark- formance is almost twice as good as that of observer ac-
adapted; dark adaptation takes time, because rods increase curacy. It is clear from the table that, not surprisingly, the
their sensitivity slowly. In this study 20 minutes was performance is much worse for phases 7, 8, 9, and 10,
allowed for adaptation before starting the experiments. when the luminances were very low. If these phases are
omitted, the CV values for accuracy become 34, 43, 15,
and for repeatability become 16, 24, 6, for brightness, col-
ourfulness and hue, respectively. These results were simi-
EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS
lar to those found in earlier experiments16 for investigat-
The visual results were recorded in terms of the magni- ing related colours.
tude-estimations of brightness, colourfulness, and hue.
Following the methods recommended by Luo et al.,16 Effects of Luminance Level of Stimuli
brightness and colourfulness attributes were averaged
using a geometric mean, and the hue attribute was aver- The change in colour appearance caused by changes in
aged using an arithmetic mean. luminance level was investigated by making comparisons
between the phases with different luminance levels of the
stimuli. There were three luminance levels, 60, 5, and 1
cd/m2 for D65, included in the Group 1 experiments. In
Observer Variation
Group 2, which was particularly aimed at investigating
The magnitude-estimation data were collected and the stimulus size effects, only one luminance level, 0.1 cd/m2
coefficient of variation (CV) was used to indicate the for D65, was applied. Therefore, the two phases in Group
agreement between any two sets of data. For the three 2 which had the same stimulus size as was used in Group
colour appearance attributes studied, CV values were cal- 1 were considered with the results from Group 1. The
culated between each individual observer’s results and the results were analysed separately according to the two dif-
average results for all the observers, to represent observer ferent stimulus sizes, 108 and 0.58.
accuracy. For perfect agreement, the CV value should be The results from a phase were plotted against another
zero. A CV of 10 roughly means 10% variation between with a 458 line drawn for all attributes. The greater the
two datasets. A colour-appearance model can be consid- deviation from the 458 line, the greater is the difference
ered as successful if the error of the model’s predictions between the results for the two phases. Figures 4–9, show
is smaller than the observer accuracy. Thus, in colour- that, for both the 108 and the 0.58 stimulus sizes, colours
appearance assessments, observer accuracy is an impor- appear brighter and more colourful at higher luminance
tant issue to form the basis of comparison of the colour- levels than at lower luminance levels, but that the hues
appearance models’ performance. are largely unchanged. In the upper three figures in Figs. 4

4 COLOR research and application

FIG. 4. Comparisons of the mean brightness visual results between four different luminance-level phases. All samples
had the same size stimuli, 108. [Color figure can be viewed in the online issue, which is available at wileyonlinelibrary.com.]

and 5 there is a tendency for the increased brightness to be Effects of Size of Stimuli
accentuated as the stimuli become of higher luminance.
For the effect of stimulus size, comparisons were made
Figure 9 showed another trend that: for the 0.58 view-
between the appearances of colours having 108 stimulus
ing field data, yellow colours became greener, when lumi-
size with those of the 0.58 stimulus size under four differ-
nance was reduced. This phenomenon is known as the
ent luminance levels. Then comparisons were also carried
Bezold-Brücke Effect.17 Note that this effect did not
out with four stimulus sizes under the luminance level of
occur for 108 viewing field data (Fig. 8).

FIG. 5. Comparisons of the mean brightness visual results between four different luminance-level phases. All samples had
the same size stimuli, 0.58. [Color figure can be viewed in the online issue, which is available at wileyonlinelibrary.com.]

Volume 00, Number 0, Month 2011 5

FIG. 6. Comparisons of the mean colourfulness visual results from four different luminance-level phases. All stimuli were
the same size, 108. [Color figure can be viewed in the online issue, which is available at wileyonlinelibrary.com.]

0.1 cd/m2 to investigate further the size effect on colour
appearance under mesopic vision.
Figure 10 shows the results for the 108 and 0.58 stimu-
lus sizes at the four different luminance levels (60, 5, 1,
and 0.1 cd/m2 for D65). For luminance level 60 cd/m2
(the first column), the 108 colours appear brighter and
more colourful than the 0.58 colours. For luminance levels
of 5 and 1 cd/m2 (the middle two columns), this tendency
is also true but to a smaller extent. For the 0.1 cd/m2
level (the right hand column), the results for the 0.58
stimulus size are about 50% lower for both brightness and
colourfulness (this will be shown more clearly in the top
right-hand sections of Figs. 11 and 12). Thus increasing
the stimulus size from 0.58 to 108 generally increases both

FIG. 7. Comparisons of the mean colourfulness visual results from four different luminance-level phases. All stimuli were
the same size, 0.58. [Color figure can be viewed in the online issue, which is available at wileyonlinelibrary.com.]

6 COLOR research and application

FIG. 8. Comparisons of the mean hue visual results between different luminance-level phases. All samples had the same
size stimuli, 108. [Color figure can be viewed in the online issue, which is available at wileyonlinelibrary.com.]

brightness and colourfulness, and this is most marked for
mesopic vision (0.1 cd/m2); this could be an important
factor in recognizing signal lights. The results for hue
(the bottom row) show that stimulus size has no effect. It
also found that the points fall below the 458 line in Fig.
11. Perhaps this is because there are only cones inside the
foveola (the central 18 field of the eye); in the central
fovea an area  0.348 is s-cone free. When the very small
field (0.58) size was used, there is a lack of the s-cones.
The above may be speculative, due to the large scatter of
the results.
The effects of field sizes of 108, 28, 18, and 0.58, all at
0.1 cd/m2 for D65 are shown in Figs. 11–13, for bright-
ness, colourfulness, and hue, respectively. In Figs. 11 and

FIG. 9. Comparisons of the mean hue visual results between different luminance-level phases. All samples had the same
size stimuli, 0.58. [Color figure can be viewed in the online issue, which is available at wileyonlinelibrary.com.]

Volume 00, Number 0, Month 2011 7

FIG. 10. Effect of stimulus size. Comparisons of the mean visual results for brightness (top), colourfulness (middle) and
hue (bottom) between four pairs of phases. The number after each hyphen is the visual angle of stimuli, 0.58 (abscissa)
and 108 (ordinate). [Color figure can be viewed in the online issue, which is available at wileyonlinelibrary.com.]

FIG. 11. Comparisons of mean brightness visual results between four different stimulus size phases. All samples had the
same luminance level, 0.1 cd/m2. Note that the range is from 0 to 50, instead of from 0 to 300 in Fig. 10. [Color figure can
be viewed in the online issue, which is available at wileyonlinelibrary.com.]
FIG. 12. Comparisons of mean colourfulness visual results between four different stimulus size phases. All samples had
the same luminance level, 0.1 cd/m2. Note that the range is from 0 to 40, instead of from 0 to 100 in Fig. 10. [Color figure
can be viewed in the online issue, which is available at wileyonlinelibrary.com.]

12, most of the points are well above the 458 line. This
shows that, at this low (mesopic) luminance level, colours
appear brighter and more colourful when the stimulus size
becomes larger; the effect is greatest when starting with a
stimulus size of 0.58. Figure 13 shows that, for hue, most
of the points are close to the 458 line, which indicates,
again, that hue is hardly changed when the stimulus size
is changed.
MODELS’ PERFORMANCE
CAM97u Performance
In CAM97u2, Hunt pointed out that, although unrelated
colours are usually perceived in surrounds of luminance
very much lower than that of the stimuli, in most practi-
cal situation the adapting luminance, LA, can not be taken
as zero, because the stimulus being considered provides

FIG. 13. Comparisons of mean hue visual results between four different stimulus size phases. All samples had the same
luminance level, 0.1 cd/m2. [Color figure can be viewed in the online issue, which is available at wileyonlinelibrary.com.]

Volume 00, Number 0, Month 2011 9

TABLE III. Comparisons between visual results and CAM97u predictions in term of CV values and scaling
factors (SF) used for scaling brightness and colourfulness predictions.
Group Phase Name Gradient-B SFm-B CV-B SFg-B CV0-B Gradient-M SFm-M CV-M SFg-M CV0-M CV-H

1 1 60–0.5 5.27 7.99 54 7.64 48 0.78 4.42 527 2.32 234 13

2 5–0.5 7.15 16 12 1.56 206 75 13
3 1–0.5 9.09 17 21 4.34 66 86 15
4 60–10 6.13 35 29 0.92 442 188 10
5 5–10 7.76 9 9 1.76 170 63 11
6 1–10 10.46 27 30 4.60 64 83 15
2 7 0.1–0.5 5.43 60 8.5 65 4.45 78 7.57 100 16
8 0.1–1 6.30 34 38 6.64 86 78 16
9 0.1–2 10.07 29 27 7.28 91 82 17
10 0.1–10 12.19 41 39 10.39 102 92 18
Mean 7.99 32 31 4.42 183 108 14

some adapting light. In CAM97u the luminance of the
adapting field is calculated in both photopic and scotopic
forms. The photopic luminance, LA, in cd/m2, is calcu-
lated as:
LK ¼ L2=3 =200
where L is the luminance of the sample.
The scotopic luminance of the adapting field (divided
by 2.26), LAS/2.26 is calculated as:
LAS =2:26 ¼ ðLS =2:26Þ2=3 =200
where LS/2.26 is the scotopic luminance of the sample.
LS/2.26 is used instead of L because LS/2.26 ¼ L for
the equi-energy stimulus, SE.
The CV value was again used to indicate the agreement
between visual results and CAM97u predictions. The
results are summarized in Table III. For comparing the
model’s brightness and colourfulness predictions with the
visual results, individual scaling factors were derived for
each phase using the gradient of a best-fit straight line
that passed through the origin (the ideal black and neutral
for brightness and colourfulness respectively).
Table III shows the CV values for brightness (CV-B),
for colourfulness (CV-M) and for hue (CV-H). Gradient-
B and Gradient-M were individual scaling factors for
brightness and colourfulness for each phase, respectively;
SFm-B and SFm-M were the mean scaling factors calcu-
lated from the average value of individual gradients for
the 10 phases; CV-B and CV-M were the comparison
results in terms of CV values between visual data and
CAM97u predictions using the mean scaling factors
(SFm). The scaling factors SFg-B and SFg-M were the
average scaling factors which are computed by mean
value of gradients for each Group; CV’-B and CV’M
were the corresponding CV values of comparisons using
the group scaling factors (SFg). CV-H were calculated
using the original data without scaling, i.e. 0, 100, 200,
300 and 400 corresponding to red, yellow, green and blue
unique hues respectively.
The results in Table III show that CAM97u predicted
the brightness and hue accurately, i.e., the predicted errors
(32 and 14 units, respectively) are smaller than the ob-
server accuracy between all observers (48 and 15 units
respectively, as shown in Table II). However, it per-
formed badly in predicting colourfulness (an average of
183 units). This was mainly caused by the large CV val-
ues at the high (60 cd/m2) luminance level. Changing the
stimulus size from 0.58 to 108 resulted in an increase in
gradient for both brightness and colourfulness, especially
at 0.1 cd/m2.
Using the mean scaling factors SFm, the average CV
values for the 10 phases are 32 and 183 for brightness
and colourfulness, respectively. Using the group scaling
factors SFg, the average CV values are 31 and 108 for
brightness and colourfulness, respectively. Thus the
brightness attribute exhibited almost no change between
the two types of scaling factors used; but for the colour-
fulness attribute, smaller mean CV values occurred when
using group scaling factors than when using mean scaling
factors. That means a better model performance for col-
ourfulness might result from using different scaling fac-
tors according to whether the luminance level was above
or at 0.1 cd/m2.
CIECAM02 Performance
As mentioned before, a version especially for unrelated
colours is not present in CIECAM02. To run CIECAM02,
certain values are needed that do not exist for unrelated
colours; these values were chosen as follows. The adopted
white was put at Y ¼ 100, x ¼ 1/3, y ¼ 1/3; this is the
same as the reference white used in CIECAM02, the per-
fect diffuser in the equi-energy illuminant, SE (this results
in the value of the multiplier of R in the equation for Rc
being equal to 1.0, and similarly in the equations for Gc
and Bc, indicating no adaptation, which is appropriate for
unrelated colours.) The luminance of the adapting field,
LA, was taken as one fifth of the luminance of the peak
white for each experimental phase (it was not felt right to
set LA at zero because each stimulus would provide some
level of adapting light). The ratio, Yb/Yw, where Yw is the
luminance factor of the adopted white and Yb that of the
background, could not be based on features of the observ-
ing conditions, because unrelated colours do not have a
background, only a surround; a value for this ratio was
therefore chosen by trial and error that gave the best pre-
dictions of the results of the experimental observations;
this value was 0.2. The values used for c, Nc, and F,

10 COLOR research and application

TABLE IV. Comparisons between visual results and CIECAM02 predictions in term of CV values and scaling
factors (SF) used for scaling brightness and colourfulness predictions.
SFsg-M SFg-M
Group Phase Name Gradient-B SFm-B CV-B SFg-B CV0-B Gradient-M SFm-M CV-M SFg-M Average Average CV0-M CV-H

1 1 60–0.5 0.88 0.77 19 0.89 13 0.92 0.71 41 0.92 0.90 0.96 32 13

2 5–0.5 0.83 19 18 0.87 41 0.87 36 12
3 1–0.5 0.77 24 29 0.92 63 0.92 57 11
4 60–10 1.04 33 24 1.06 53 1.06 1.02 38 12
5 5–10 0.92 21 14 0.98 44 0.98 28 10
6 1–10 0.91 22 16 1.03 50 1.03 34 10
2 7 0.1–0.5 0.37 129 0.58 77 0.19 309 0.33 102 14
8 0.1–1 0.44 90 47 0.29 184 60 14
9 0.1–2 0.70 30 31 0.34 136 52 13
10 0.1–10 0.89 23 40 0.50 69 64 15
Mean 7.99 41 31 0.71 99 50 13

were those for a dark surround: c ¼ 0.525, Nc ¼ 0.8,
and F ¼ 0.8.
Using the mean scaling factors (SFm), the average CV
values of the 10 phases are 41 and 99 for brightness and
colourfulness, respectively. When using group scaling fac-
tors (SFg), the average CV values are 31 and 50 for
brightness and colourfulness, respectively. Both brightness
and colourfulness attributes showed smaller mean CV val-
ues when using group scaling factors compared with those
obtained using mean scaling factors. For the colourfulness
attribute in particular there is a large improvement from
99 to 50 CV values. This means that a better model per-
formance occurred when using different group scaling
factors categorized by different luminance levels (above
or at 0.1 cd/m2); a similar improvement was also found
for CAM97u for colourfulness. This confirms that the vis-
ual data should be analyzed in groups based on the lumi-
nance levels, and this also indicates that the model can be
further improved by adding a parameter related to the
luminance levels of stimuli. As was the case for
CAM97u, changing the stimulus size from 0.58 to 108
resulted in an increase in gradient for both brightness and
colourfulness especially at 0.1 cd/m2. (Also shown in
Table IV are average colourfulness scaling factors, SFsg,
for the subgroups 1, 2, 3 and 4, 5, 6; these will be used
in Step 3 of a new model to be described below.)
Comparison of CAM97u and CIECAM02 Performance
As described in the previous sections, colour-appear-
ance models, CAM97u and CIECAM02, were tested
using the unrelated visual data. Comparing their perform-
ance, CAM97u outperforms CIECAM02 for brightness
according to the mean-scaled predictions, i.e., the pre-
dicted errors were 32 and 41 units for CAM97u and CIE-
CAM02, respectively. For colourfulness, CIECAM02 out-
performs CAM97u according to the mean-scaled predic-
tions, i.e., the predicted errors were 183 and 99 units for
CAM97u and CIECAM02, respectively. When using the
group scaling factors, improvements were made in pre-
dicting brightness and colourfulness results for both mod-
els studied. When further investigations were made in
each group using the subgroup scaling factors according
to different stimulus sizes, it was found that the stimulus
size effect was not very obvious in the Group 1 experi-
ments, but it had a significant impact in the Group 2
experiments (luminance level at 0.1 cd/m2) for both mod-
els. In addition, the mean-scale factor for the 0.58 stimu-
lus size was smaller than that for the 108 stimulus size for
both brightness and colourfulness, which implies that col-
ours appeared darker and less colourful for a 0.58 size.
This tendency was observed in both CAM97u and CIE-
CAM02 models.
In general, for the hue attribute, differences in colour
appearance between each model and the visual results
were small. This indicates that the perceived hue does not
exhibit significant differences for the different parameters
investigated. For both colour-appearance models,
CAM97u and CIECAM02, the predictions to the hue vis-
ual results were satisfactory, i.e., the predicted errors (14
and 13 units for CAM97u and CIECAM02, respectively)
are smaller than the observer accuracy (15 units, as shown
in Table II). In summary, the results showed that the two
models gave reasonably satisfactory performance for
brightness and hue results, in that the errors of predictions
are smaller than the typical observer accuracy. CAM97u
predicted more accurately than CIECAM02 for brightness
data, but much worse for colourfulness. For the hue at-
tribute, the two models perform similarly. This suggests
that an improved model for unrelated colours might be
achieved by combining features of CAM97u and
CIECAM02.
Unrelated-Colour Modeling
Only a few colour-appearance models include a rod
contribution: Hunt94, CAM97c and CAM97u. In fact, the
rod contribution modeled in CAM97c and CAM97u is
originally based on that of the Hunt94 model which
assumes that the achromatic signal consists of cone and
rod signals. The colour-difference signals, however, are
based on the cone signals only, without any rod contribu-

Volume 00, Number 0, Month 2011 11

FIG. 14. (a). Relationship between k values and luminance levels. Points: optimized values; curves: k ¼ 25.3log10(L) þ
44.5 for 0.58; k ¼ 25.9log10(L) þ 50.3 for 108. (b) Relationship between k values and stimulus sizes at 0.1 cd/m2. Points:
optimized values; curve: k ¼ -12.7log10(y) þ 22.7.
tion. The new model was developed following the same
approach.
Hunt suggested that the scotopic luminance (LS) di-
vided by 2.26 is assumed to be equal to the photopic
luminance (L) in CAM97u. It is used to calculate the sco-
topic luminance in the new model. Subsequently, the
compressed cone signals and rod signals are used to cal-
culate a cone contribution (Aa) and a rod contribution
(AS) to provide a total the achromatic signal (A). As with
the cone signal, the scotopic luminance (representing the
rod signal) was compressed by a power function to com-
pute the rod contribution. The exponent (0.42) in the
power function follows that of the dynamic adaptation
function in CIECAM029. The whole achromatic signal A
was calculated as shown below. The cone contribution
(Aa) is obtained from CIECAM02.
AS ¼ L0:42
S matching functions (28 or 108).
A ¼ Aa þ kAS
where the constant k is used to determine the ratio
between cone and rod contributions. In other words, the
proportions of AS are different according to the different
viewing conditions used. The constant k needs to be
determined empirically. It was calculated by the
‘‘optimal’’ method in Matlab using the visual data, i.e., k
was obtained by minimizing the difference between
model predictions and visual data.
It was found that there is a change in k due to lumi-
nance level. The k values increase with a reduction of
luminance levels until reaching 0.1 cd/m2. This can be
explained by the rods becoming more active when lumi-
nance level is reduced. As a result, a larger rod contribu-
tion occurs which is represented by a larger k value at the
lower luminance levels until reaching 0.1 cd/m2. At a
luminance level of 0.1 cd/m2, a reduction in k occurs with
smaller stimulus size; this is to be expected because of
the small number of rods in the foveola.
Figure 14(a) shows the relationship between the lumi-
nance levels and optimized k values for luminance levels
12
above or close to 1 cd/m2. Figure 14(b) shows the rela-
tionship between the stimulus sizes and the optimized k
values for the luminance level at 0.1 cd/m2.
It can be seen that the R2 values are almost unity,
which indicates that the best-fit curves represent the rela-
tionships very well between luminance levels and the k
values; and between stimulus sizes and the k values.
The brightness correlate (Q) in CAM97u was simplified
and then applied to the new model as shown in the equa-
tion below; the colourfulness, M, is obtained from the
new-CAM02 model (see Step 4 below).
Qnew ¼ A þ Mnew =100 (3)
The computation procedure of the new model is as fol-
lows.
Step 1: Measure or calculate absolute tristimulus values
for the test colour stimulus corresponding to CIE colour
XL ¼ xL=y YL ¼ L ZL ¼ ð1  x  yÞL=y
Step 2: Calculate the cone achromatic signal (Aa), col-
ourfulness (M), and hue (Hc) based on the forward CIE-
CAM02. Since there is no reference white involved with
unrelated colours, a white point of (Y ¼ 100, x ¼ 1/3, y
¼ 1/3) is used as the reference white in the calculation
when CIECAM02 is used. The luminance of the adapting
field is taken as 1/5 of the luminance of the filtered or
unfiltered D65 white; the surround parameters are set as
those under dark viewing conditions.
Step 3: Calculate the scaling factor KM. When the lumi-
nance level is above or close to 1 cd/m2, KM is obtained
from the sub-group scaling factors for CIECAM02 in Table
IV (0.90 for 0.58 and 1.02 for 108. Note that in order to
simplify the model, KM is taken as 1 instead of 1.02 which
was obtained from experiment.When L ‡ 1 cd/m2KM ¼ 0.9
for 0.58 stimuliKM ¼ 1 for 108 stimuli
When the luminance level is less than 1 cd/m2, KM is
obtained from a function of stimulus size based on the
Fig. 15.
COLOR research and application
 results showed that the size effect is more likely to be no-
ticeable under low luminance level such as 0.1 cd/m2.
It was found that the stimulus size effect was not very
obvious in Group 1 experiments, but it gave a significant
impact in Group 2 experiments (luminance level at 0.1
cd/m2). Therefore, when the luminance level is below 1
cd/m2, only size effect is taken into consideration. How-
ever, future study should include a wider scope of sizes
and luminance levels of stimuli.

The New Model’s Performances

FIG. 15. Relationship between stimulus sizes (in degrees)
and gradients obtained from CIECAM02 for colourfulness.
Points: values from Table IV; curve: KM ¼ 0.1 3 log10(y) þ
0.27. The high value of R2 indicates a good fit. [Color
figure can be viewed in the online issue, which is available
at wileyonlinelibrary.com.]
When L \ 1 cd/m2
KM ¼ 0:13 log10 ðhÞ þ 0:27
where y is the stimulus size in degrees.
Step 4: Calculate colourfulness (Mnew) in the new
model.
Mnew ¼ KM 3M
Step 5: Calculate the rod contribution AS in the new
model.Scotopic luminances LS LS/2.26 ¼ L
Rod contribution AS
AS ¼ L0:42
S ducted under mesopic vision.
Step 6: Calculate the whole achromatic signal A in the
new model. Note that Aa is obtained from Step 2.
A ¼ Aa þ kAs
when L ‡ 1 cd/m 2
The colour-appearance model developed in the last sec-
tion is tested in this section. The results (in terms of CV
values) are given in Table V together with inter-observer
accuracy from Table II. Since there is no reliable visual
data available to describe unrelated colours, it is impor-
tant to note that only the visual results obtained from this
study could be used to test the new model. Obviously, the
same data sets were used to derive the new model and to
test it. This procedure could have limitations, and so a
more rigorous evaluation of the model would be obtained
if results from other investigations of unrelated colours
were available.
The results in Table V show that the new model gave
satisfactory predictions to all visual attributes (brightness,
colourfulness and hue), i.e., the prediction errors (16, 45,
13) are all smaller than the inter-observer variation (48,
56 and 15). The new model had the largest prediction
error of 45 for colourfulness. This agrees well with the
fact that colourfulness is the most difficult perceptual at-
tribute to be judged by observers using magnitude-estima-
tion. Another reason for the high prediction error in col-
ourfulness is that some phases in this study were con-
In Figs. 16–18, the experimentally determined values
for brightness, colourfulness and hue, averaged for all the
observers, are plotted as ordinate against the predictions
by the model as abscissa. It can be seen that the scatter of

k ¼ 5:33 log10 ðLÞ þ 44:5 for 0:5o stumuli

TABLE V. Comparisons between visual results and
k ¼ 5:93 log10 ðLÞ þ 50:3 for 10o stumuli
new model predictions; and the inter-observer
when L \ 1 cd/m2 variations in terms of CV values for brightness,
colourfulness and hue.
k ¼ 1:273 log10 ðhÞ þ 22:7
Step 7: Calculate the brightness attribute (Qnew) in the New model Inter-observer
performance accuracy
new model.
Phase Name CV-B CV-M CV-H CV-B CV-M CV-H
Qnew ¼ A þ Mnew =100
1 60–0.5 10 29 13 28 48 13
In CAM97u a conditioning field could be introduced to 2 5–0.5 11 35 12 34 48 15
represent adaptation to a field of significant luminance 3 1–0.5 12 54 11 40 44 13
4 60–10 15 33 12 29 39 15
viewed immediately before observing the unrelated col- 5 5–10 11 25 10 36 43 15
our; the new model does not include such a conditioning 6 1–10 12 31 10 38 37 17
field. 7 0.1–0.5 31 65 14 78 82 19
8 0.1–1 24 61 14 79 78 18
When the luminance level is above 1 cd/m2, KM and k 9 0.1–2 22 56 13 61 72 14
values cannot be defined with the new model for other 10 0.1–10 16 52 15 55 68 14
field sizes than 0.58 and 108. However, the experimental Mean 16 45 13 48 56 15

Volume 00, Number 0, Month 2011 13

FIG. 16. Comparisons between the new model predictions (the mean scaling factor is about 1) and visual brightness data
for each phase. [Color figure can be viewed in the online issue, which is available at wileyonlinelibrary.com.]

FIG. 17. Comparisons between new model predictions (the mean scaling factor is about 1) and visual colourfulness data
for each phase. [Color figure can be viewed in the online issue, which is available at wileyonlinelibrary.com.]
 FIG. 18. Comparisons between new model predictions and the visual hue data for each phase.

the points from the 458 line is smallest for hue, followed
by brightness, showing that the model is performing well.
Although the scatter in the case of colourfulness is larger,
it is no worse than the scatter in Figs. 6, 7, and 12.
The scales of the diagrams in the bottom row of Figs.
16 and 17, the experimentally determined results for
brightness and colourfulness, at 0.1 cd/m2, are plotted
with a smaller scale than that of the others for legibility.
It can be seen that they have a larger scatter than those of
the others. This is expected due to larger observer vari-
ability as found earlier at luminance level of 0.1 cd/m2
(see Table II).
Figure 19(a) shows the brightness and colourfulness
changes for a red colour of medium saturation (relative to

FIG. 19. (a): The brightness and colourfulness predicted by the new model for a sample varying in luminance level with
28 stimulus size. (b): The brightness and colourfulness predicted by the new model for a sample varying in stimulus size at
0.1 cd/m2 luminance level.

Volume 00, Number 0, Month 2011 15

SE, huv ¼ 3558, and suv ¼ 1.252) as predicted by the new
model under different luminance levels.. The luminance Sample2
levels were varied from 0.01 to 1000 cd/m2, and LA was X Y Z 0.086 0.100 0.013
set at one fifth of these values. The ratio Yb/Yw set at 0.2. Xw Yw Zw 100.0 100.0 100.0
Figure 19(b) shows the brightness and colourfulness Yb c Nc 20.0 0.53 0.8
F n z 0.8 0.20 1.93
changes, for the same red colour, predicted by the new y (8) LA D 1 0.02 0.659
model for different stimulus sizes ranging from 0.28 to Nbb Ncb FL 1.00 1.00 0.02
408. The luminance level (L) was set at 0.1 cd/m2. It can R G B 103.86 109.29 14.63
Rw Gw Bw 100.00 100.00 100.00
be seen that brightness and colourfulness increase when Rc Gc Bc 103.86 109.29 14.63
luminance increases up to around 100 cd/m2, and they Rcw Gcw Bcw 100.0 100.0 100.0
also increase when stimulus size increases. These results Xc Yc Zc 86.0 100.0 13.2
Xcw Ycw Zcw 100.0 100.0 100.0
agree well with the phenomena found in this study, i.e., R’ G’ B’ 101.4 99.2 13.2
when luminance level increases, colours become brighter R’w G’w B’w 100.0 100.0 100.0
and more colourful, and larger colours appear brighter R’a G’a B’a 2.8 2.8 1.3
R’aw G’aw B’aw 2.8 2.8 2.8
and more colourful than smaller sized colours; however, a b h -0.11565 0.346889 108.4383
below a luminance of 0.1 cd/m2 and above a luminance e Hc Aw 2361.489 Y68G32 8.327977
of 60 cd/m2, and below a stimulus size of 0.58 and above Aa s Ls 8.272203 85.22379 0.23
As k A 0.54 22.70 20.43
a stimulus size of 108, these results are extrapolations, M Q H 6.75 20.49 132.063
and must be treated with caution.
CONCLUSIONS
Worked Examples
The results obtained by the magnitude scaling of unre-
Worked examples are given for two colours at the lated colours were as follows. Over the range of lumi-
end of the article to facilitate the use of the model for nances from 60 cd/m2 to 0.1 cd/m2, for both 0.58 and
unrelated colours. 108 stimulus sizes, colours appeared brighter and more
colourful at higher luminance levels than at lower lumi-
Sample 1: x ¼ 0.4318, y ¼ 0.5018, L ¼ 5.00 cd m22, nance levels, but the hues were largely unchanged.
field size 108 Increasing the stimulus size from 0.58 to 108 generally
Sample 2: x ¼ 0.4318, y ¼ 0.5018, L ¼ 0.10 cd m22, increased both brightness and colourfulness, and this
field size 18 was most marked for mesopic vision (0.1 cd/m2); this
could be an important factor in recognizing signal lights.
Stimulus size had no effect on hue.
The results were used to test the performance of the
x y L (cd/m2) y(8)
CAM97u and CIECAM02 models. This showed that the
Sample1 0.4318 0.5018 5.00 10 two models gave similar satisfactory performances for
Sample2 0.4318 0.5018 0.10 1 brightness and hue, in that the errors of predictions were
Lw 1/3. 1/3. 100
smaller than the typical observer accuracy. CAM97u
performed slightly better than CIECAM02 for brightness
but worse for colourfulness. A new colour-appearance
model was developed for unrelated colours by combin-
Sample1 ing the best features of both models, and adding parame-
ters to represent the effects of luminance level and stim-
X Y Z 4.302 5.000 0.662
Xw Yw Zw 100.0 100.0 100.0 ulus size. The new model gave satisfactory predictions
Yb c Nc 20.0 0.53 0.8 of brightness, colourfulness, and hue, in that the predic-
F n z 0.8 0.20 1.93 tion errors were smaller than the inter-observer accuracy.
y (8) LA D 10 1 0.661
Nbb Ncb FL 1.00 1.00 0.17 However, the model was tested against the same data
R G B 103.86 109.29 14.63 that were used in its development, and further validation
Rw Gw Bw 100.00 100.00 100.00 is desirable, but this awaits the availability of new data
Rc Gc Bc 103.86 109.29 14.63
Rcw Gcw Bcw 100.0 100.0 100.0 for the appearance of unrelated colours. Furthermore,
Xc Yc Zc 86.0 100.0 13.2 efforts are required to derive an inverse model, which is
Xcw Ycw Zcw 100.0 100.0 100.0 used to find a desired colour for a signal light, or a suit-
R’ G’ B’ 101.4 99.2 13.2
R’w G’w B’w 100.0 100.0 100.0 able luminance level for a light to detect an obstacle on
R’a G’a B’a 7.0 7.0 3.1 the road, a suitable colour to wear to walk at night.
R’aw G’aw B’aw 7.0 7.0 7.0
a b h -0.29181 0.874057 108.4618
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