Skip to main content

Appearance

  • Living reference work entry
  • Latest version View entry history
  • First Online:
Encyclopedia of Color Science and Technology

Synonyms

Color appearance; Perceptual appearance; Total appearance; Visual appearance

Definition

Visual appearance refers to how things look to observers. Objects have physical properties, and in this regard, optical properties are usually most relevant together with size, texture, shape, etc. But what finally matters for vision is the appearance that objects have for an observer (human observers will be mainly referred to in this article; however, this is not restrictive to human beings since there are many other living species that have similar visual processing systems). The American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM) as well as the International Commission on Illumination (CIE) define appearance as the aspect of visual experience by which objects are recognized [1, 2]. The ASTM specifies, furthermore, the definition of appearance from a psychophysical point of view: “perception in which the spectral and geometric aspects of a visual stimulus are integrated with its...

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Institutional subscriptions

References

  1. ASTM, American Society for Testing and Materials: Standard Terminology of Appearance. Standard E 284-01. ASTM, West Conshohocken (2001)

    Google Scholar 

  2. CIE, Commission Internationale de l’Eclairage, Technical Committee 1-65: CIE Technical Report: A Framework for the Measurement of Visual Appearance. CIE Central Bureau, Viena (2006)

    Google Scholar 

  3. Katz, D.: Der Aufbau der Farbwelt, 2nd ed. of Die Erscheinungsweisen der Farben Und ihre Beeinflussung durch die individuelle Erfahrung. Johann Ambrosius Barth, Leipzig (1911/1930). English translation by MacLeod, R.B., Fox, C.W.: The World of Colour. Keagan Paul, Trench, Trubner, London (1935)

    Google Scholar 

  4. Pope, A.: The Language of Drawing and Painting. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA (1949)

    Book  Google Scholar 

  5. Optical Society of America: Committee on Colorimetry: The Science of Color. Crowell, New York (1953) Chapter 2

    Google Scholar 

  6. Hunter, R.S.: The Measurement of Appearance. Wiley, New York (1975)

    Google Scholar 

  7. Pfund, A.H.: The measurement of gloss. J. Opt. Soc. Am. 20, 23–26 (1930)

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

  8. ASTM, American Society for Testing Materials: Standard Recommended Practice for Selection of Geometric Conditions for Measurement of Reflectance and Transmittance. Standard E, pp. 179–173. American Society for Testing and Materials, Philadelphia (1974)

    Google Scholar 

  9. ASTM, American Society for Testing and Materials: Standard Guide for Selection of Geometric Conditions for Measurement of Reflection and Transmission Properties of Materials. Standard E, p. 179. ASTM International (1990)

    Google Scholar 

  10. ASTM, American Society for Testing and Materials: Standard Test Method for Visual Evaluation of Gloss Differences Between Surfaces of Similar Appearance. Standard D, p. 4449. ASTM International (1990)

    Google Scholar 

  11. ASTM, American Society for Testing and Materials: ASTM Standards on Color and Appearance Measurement, 5th edn. ASTM, Philadelphia (1996)

    Google Scholar 

  12. Hunt, R.W.G.: Measurement of color appearance. J. Opt. Soc. Am. 55(11), 1540–1551 (1965)

    Article  ADS  Google Scholar 

  13. Hesselgren, S.: The Language of Architecture. Studentlitteratur, Lund (1967)

    Google Scholar 

  14. Evans, R.M.: The Perception of Color. Wiley, New York (1974)

    Google Scholar 

  15. Metelli, F.: The perception of transparency. Sci. Am. 230(4), 90–98 (1974)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  16. Da Pos, O.: Trasparenze. Icone Editrice, Padova (1990)

    Google Scholar 

  17. Hutchings, J.B.: The concept and philosophy of total appearance. In: Nemcsics, A., Schanda, J. (eds.) Colour 93, Proceedings of the 7th Congress of the International Colour Association, vol. C, pp. 55–59. Hungarian National Colour Committee, Budapest (1993)

    Google Scholar 

  18. Hutchings, J.B.: The continuity of colour, design, art, and science (I and II). Color. Res. Appl. 20(5), 296–312 (1995)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  19. Hutchings, J.B.: Food Color and Appearance, 2nd edn. Aspen Publishers, Gaithersburg (1999)

    Book  Google Scholar 

  20. Green-Armytage, P.: Colour and other aspects of appearance. Spect. Newsl. Colour Soc, Aust. 6(3), 1–11 (1992)

    Google Scholar 

  21. Green-Armytage, P.: Beyond colour. In: Nemcsics, A., Schanda, J. (eds.) Colour 93, Proceedings of the 7th Congress of the International Colour Association, vol. A, pp. 155–162. Hungarian National Colour Committee, Budapest (1993)

    Google Scholar 

  22. Green-Armytage, P.: Tincture – a new/old word for the appearance of things. J. Sch. Des. 2, 16–23 (1993)

    Google Scholar 

  23. Sève, R.: Problems connected with the concept of gloss. Color. Res. Appl. 18(4), 241–252 (1993)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  24. Brill, M.H.: The perception of a colored translucent sheet on a background. Color. Res. Appl. 19(1), 34–36 (1994)

    MathSciNet  Google Scholar 

  25. Jannello, C.: Texture as a visual phenomenon. Archit. Des. 33, 394–396 (1963)

    Google Scholar 

  26. Caivano, J.: Cesia: a system of visual signs complementing color. Color. Res. Appl. 16, 258–268 (1991)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  27. Caivano, J.: Appearance (cesia): construction of scales by means of spinning disks. Color. Res. Appl. 19, 351–362 (1994)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  28. Caivano, J.: Cesia: its relation to color in terms of the trichromatic theory. Die. Farbe. 42(1/3), 51–63 (1996)

    Google Scholar 

  29. Caivano, J.: An atlas of cesia with physical samples. In: AIC Color 97, Proceedings of the 8th Congress, vol. I, pp. 499–502. Color Science Association of Japan, Kyoto (1997)

    Google Scholar 

  30. Giglio, M.: Dynamics of color and cesia in the urban landscape: transience and perception of differences. In: Proceedings of the International Colour Association (AIC) Conference 2019, pp. 324–325. AIC, Newtown (2019)

    Google Scholar 

  31. Wittgenstein, L.: Bemerkungen über die Farben (1950–1951). English translation by McAlister, L., Schättle, M.: Remarks on Colour. University of California Press, Berkeley (1977)

    Google Scholar 

  32. Lozano, R.D.: A new approach to appearance characterization. Color. Res. Appl. 31, 164–167 (2006)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  33. Green-Armytage, P.: A model to link different modes and different aspects of appearance. In: AIC 2011 Interaction of colour and light Proceedings of the Midterm Meeting of the International Color Association, pp. 165–168. Pro/colore, Zurich (2011)

    Google Scholar 

  34. Green-Armytage, P.: More than colour – dimensions of light and appearance. J. Int. Color. Assoc. 17, 1–27 (2017)

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to José Luis Caivano or Paul Green-Armytage .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

Section Editor information

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2022 Springer Science+Business Media LLC

About this entry

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this entry

Caivano, J.L., Green-Armytage, P. (2022). Appearance. In: Shamey, R. (eds) Encyclopedia of Color Science and Technology. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-27851-8_225-2

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-27851-8_225-2

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-642-27851-8

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-642-27851-8

  • eBook Packages: Springer Reference Physics and AstronomyReference Module Physical and Materials ScienceReference Module Chemistry, Materials and Physics

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Chapter history

  1. Latest

    Appearance
    Published:
    04 June 2022

    DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-27851-8_225-2

  2. Original

    Appearance
    Published:
    06 August 2015

    DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-27851-8_225-1