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Metamerism is the matching of apparent color of objects with lights that have different spectral power distributions. Colors that match are called metamers.
Color of the Light
The light coming from any light source (sunlight, incandescent lamp) can be described by the so-called spectral power distribution, often denoted as SPD. The SPD gives the amount of power radiated by the light source as a function of wavelength in the visible range of the electromagnetic spectrum being 380–740 nm. Every SPD will generate a color impression in the human visual system. To describe the color of the light, a system has been developed by the CIE (Commission Internationale de l’Eclairage). A set of three color-matching functions called x(λ), y(λ), and z(λ) has been defined, and these are known collectively as the CIE standard observer [1]. These color-matching functions are depicted below in Fig. 1.
Color-matching functions CIE
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References
ISO 11664-1:2007(E)/CIE S 014-1/E:2006: Joint ISO/CIE Standard: Colorimetry Part 1. CIE Standard Colorimetric Observers
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© 2016 Springer Science+Business Media New York
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van der Burgt, P. (2016). Metamerism. In: Luo, M.R. (eds) Encyclopedia of Color Science and Technology. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-8071-7_150
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-8071-7_150
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