Introduction:
This experiment involves an item purchased in a shop that is believed to be dark blue but when taken home turns out to be black. This experiment is to investigate the differences between natural light and artificial light. Artificial light and natural light can vary the way that our eyes see the color of something. Natural light is just light produced by the sun but artificial light includes light from electric devices, fluorescent lights and light bulbs. When artificial light is being used some items of clothing may appear a lighter color than what they really are. Fluorescent lights can give off a green, pink, red or yellow tinge that changes how we see colors of clothes.
Equipment:
Several different colored fabrics (must include black and dark blue), different colored light (red, yellow and green), a normal light bulb and a light box.
Procedure:
- Collect different colored fabrics, light lenses and light box
- Turn on light box in a shaded area
- Test each fabric under normal light
- Test each fabric under the three different colored lights
- Write down results
Hypothesis:
This experiment will hope to show the ways that artificial light differs from natural light. This experiment will hope to have accurate results by having multiple testing with the different lights. I predict that in this experiment that all of the artificial colors we test will change the color of the fabric somehow and that the fabric will be the true color under the natural light. I predict that the yellow and red light will have the most change on the black fabric and will make it seem dark blue and I also predict that the yellow light will make the dark blue fabric a slightly lighter shade of blue.
Results:
In this experiment we did a test of the two different fabrics using three artificial colored lights and one normal light bulb.
| Fabric Colour | Red Light | Yellow Light | Green Light | Normal Light |
| Black Fabric | Looks Dark Blue | Looks Dark Blue | Gives a green tinge | Looks slightly lighter black |
| Dark Blue Fabric | Looked more of a dull blue | Looked slightly lighter colour | Gives a green tinge | No Obvious Change |
As the results show in this experiment the black fabric looks dark blue when under most kinds of fluorescent light, has a greenish tinge under the green light and looks a lighter shade of black when under a normal light bulb. The Dark Blue Fabric looks a lighter blue when under the yellow artificial light, duller when under the red light and it has no obvious change of color when under the normal light bulb.
Conclusion:
This experiment has clearly shown in its results that most kinds of artificial light alter the color of fabrics or objects. To find out the true color of an object you would have to look at it under natural light like the sun. This experiment supported my hypothesis because the black fabric did appear dark blue when under some artificial lights and the dark blue fabric did look a lighter color under the yellow light. This experiment shows that any artificial lights may affect the way our eye interprets colors.
