The Color Orange

[William Anderson]

Orange it is. I'm sold.

[Roadkill]

Reed,

It has been a long time from my university class on perception but aren"t you comparing additive color of light from the computer screen to subtractive color of light on the flies. Doesn't the additive light color mix only apply if the fly generates light energy?

[overmywaders]

Roadkill,

If I were trying to produce colors on three-dimensional material, then I would concern myself with the appropriate inks in CMY (cyan/magenta/yellow), a subtractive color scheme. However, I am referring to the diffuse light reflected from the object (or emitted from the monitor). It is light that is operative at that point and that light, whether reflected or emitted, is in certain wavelengths. You can now filter the light you see to remove some wavelengths, for example with a camera filter or muddy water, thereby altering the wavelengths (interpreted as colors) that reach the retina.

So, you may start with a subtractive method of creating colored light - such as pigments or dyes - or with an additive method, such as a monitor; it doesn't matter which, because once the light is emitted or reflected, it corresponds to certain wavelengths, and the retina of trout (UV aside again) interpret the wavelengths with peaks at much the same point as humans. Light is light, however it may be generated.

I hope that makes sense.

Best regards,
Reed

[overmywaders]

Roadkill,

I thought of a clearer illustration but couldn't edit the last post. Here is a better analogy:

I put my laptop on the carpet, which has a lot of burgundy coloration. Using a program like Photoshop I create a large splotch of the same color on the computer screen. The rug color was created using a subtractive color scheme, the laptop color was created using an additive color scheme. Now, with my camera I take a digital image (using the RGB pixels on the sensor/Bayer array). The image from the camera sees both the colors - rug and laptop - as burgundy. The camera doesn't need to know how the light it receives is generated - whether reflected from the rug or emitted from the monitor; because all of it is simply electromagnetic wavelengths that activate the appropriate pixels ( in trout, retinal cones).

Regards,
Reed

[kacbo]

Very interesting tropic!

Just my two (or three) cents:

1. water, observed as absorptive media is OK, but it is even more OK to look at it as a optical (colored) filter. Green - as in waters with plankton (most of ww lakes and rivers), red - as in run off, blue - as in off coast ocean and glacier lakes... Point is: because waters we fish aren't just clear H2O, effects of optical filtering of light in water are more obvious and and more significant to fishermen, than absorption of light.

2. many chitin covered creatures, eaten by fish, may become orange due process of digestion. As crawfish and shrimps become orange when cooked. That doesn't implies that orange creatures in fish stomach was orange when swallowed.

3. chitin is amber like color, which is kind of orange?

[overmywaders]

kacbo,

Just to touch your number one point. There are two basic types of optical filters, absorptive and interference (a.k.a., dichroic). Absorptive filters may absorb some wavelengths (perhaps converting them to heat), reflect some wavelengths, scatter some, transmit some, and interfere (cancel by 1/4 wave interference) with others. The water and air act as absorptive filters. I don't think we disagree about the principles involved, just the terminology.

From an angling perspective, scattering of light is very important. For example, fine silica particles (very fine sand) suspended in what appears to be clear water will cause a scattering of light for the fish below. This may, or may not, affect the color of objects but it has a tremendous effect on the trout's view of your fly. The scattering creates a superb background of ambient light, whether the trout is looking up or straight upstream. On a bright day, a white or pale fly would be difficult to see in this water, but any medium to dark fly would stand out against the light background. Tannin-stained water would provide a darker - but not dark - backdrop against which a very dark fly, black for instance or peacock herl, would stand out nicely.

Strangely, very clear water with no solids in suspension makes it more difficult for the fish to detect (as distinguished from "see") your fly. That is because the trout sees all the different colored and shaped rocks as the background and a single fly may not stand out. However, a fly with tinsel will flash and attract the trout's attention that something is drifting there. Perhaps really clear water is so hard to fish not because the trout are warier or smarter, but because our flies are harder for the trout to detect. Of course, if the fly is drifting above the fish, rather than at its level, the fly will be readily detected against the background of the sky.

Just some observations from a guy who spends too much time designing camouflage and optical filters. Sorry if I rambled on too much on this thread, I find the subject fascinating.

Regards,
Reed

P.S. - another point that kacbo introduced - the color of a nymph we hold in our hand, is probably not the color it appeared to the trout when the nymph was crawling the bottom, four feet under water. Most of the red tones would be missing. But we can't always tell what that means. For example, if the nymph is gray and you remove the red, then it would look blue-green on the riverbed. The first time I saw a lobster when diving at thirty feet I was astounded - it was bright green! All the other colors had been removed by the water, this is what it looked like normally, not "red as a lobster", but "green as a lobster".

[DUBBN]

I wonder how a fish' brain processes colors, from it's eyes?

While our brain tell us a lobster as bright green at 30 feet, does it look perfectly camouflaged to a fish'?

I like the color Orange, but for nymph fishing most of my success comes from drab colored patterns, ranging from Black to Gray to Olive with Tan and Brown thrown in. Orange becomes important to me when I know there are October Caddis, Orange Scuds, or certain Stone Nymphs present.

Just my observations, and opinion. I have never cared to conduct an organized study on the subject.

[hankaye]

Howdy All;

I always find it interesting that folks tend to forget to mention that
as we decend into water the color spetrum gradually dissapears with
red being the first to goat a shallow depth (20 or so feet).

http://www.deep-six.com/page77.htm

ergo ( ), the lobster at 30 feet is supposed to look green, it has no choise...

Coffee just got done... good thing. these conversations make my head hurt...

hank

[flyfishwithme]

Crikey! As they say in Yorkshire (my adopted place of residence) "you are coin my sad in".
This is one of the best threads I have read and it opens up so many recollections, questions and just brain teasing.
Reed,
I like what you say about tannin coloured waters.
It might suggest why, when asked what fly one should use, the answer always comes back - use three colours black, black and black.
Now a question to you.
In Yorkshire, where the North Country flies originated and are still used today, the streams are mostly tannin throughout the year. Depending on the run-off from the moors the colour is lighter or darker.
Now I am not naive enough to think that those older fly fishermen worried about cloud cones in fish, but the dominate thread colour was Yellow, then Orange and lastly Purple.
These colours still hold true today.
yet, from what I understand, these colours would be different in the tannin coloured waters. For example Orange would become yellow and yellow would become green (I have no idea what purple becomes).
Your thoughts?

[Jim Slattery]

Reed,
I have been re reading Skues "The Way of Trout with a Fly" and his observations on color and trout vision seem pretty keen given the scientific information available to him at the time (1921). What is your take on his theories and do you think that UV may answer some of his most perplexing questions?
Jim