Looking for an internet source with color chart to help me describe
flesh tones with descriptive adjectives, preferably for all races, but
a least for native africans.

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Clarification of Question by kongulu-ga on 18 Jan 2003 22:11 PST

Thank you all for your responses. I was really hoping for a consumer
type web link lets say to some beauty magazine that would have skin
swatches with descriptions. I do not need the information for
technical purposes.

Kongulu,
            this is more dificult question that it seems.

  Main problem is that different monitors will display colors
differently,
 so, to associate labels (names) in a univeral way, one needs to
provide
 an  objective definition, not just swatches. Objective definition is
given by
 trichromatic coeficients, to a degree by RGB or by Munsel scale.

Here is  information about the ColorChecker from GretagMacbeth:
"The ColorChecker is a checkerboard array of 24 scientifically
prepared colored squares in a wide range of colors. Many of these
squares represent natural objects of special interest, such as human
skin, foliage, and blue sky.

http://homepages.borland.com/efg2lab/Graphics/Colors/ColorCharts.htm

The topic of skin color aquired  certain tabu quality, which makes the
answer dificult to find:

There are some pages and books for children, design to promote racial
tolerance, which talk about names of skin color:
http://www.pbs.org/kcts/preciouschildren/diversity/read_activities.html
or
http://www.comeunity.com/adoption/books/0multiracial.html

and some (inovative) names for people of mixed blood:
http://www.mixedfolks.com/names.htm

It may be easiest to just look for general color names:
http://www.crayola.com/colorcensus/history/chronology.cfm

like here (the hex number given defined RGB)
http://catless.ncl.ac.uk/Lindsay/swatch0.html


and to search Online Color Swatch Card:

http://www.eternasilk.com/EternaSilk_swatchcard1.htm

   That, would be a  'search term' suitable for additional search.

Hope this helps

hedgie

Excellent value. Provided a range of answers with links to each variation of answer.

Hi kongulu,

I came across something called Von Luschan's Chromatic Scale. It might
be what you're looking for. I could only find one URL for an image of
it, but that page was no longer available. Maybe another researcher
can find more.

revbrenda1st

Hi kongulu,

I followed up on Revbrenda's lead. Von Luschan's Chromatic Scale is
actually a device for comparing skin tones, not a descriptive device.
There is a photograph and description of it here:

"There are 36 opaque glass tiles for confronting the subject's
skin-colour.."

Anthropometrical Instruments
http://www.unifi.it/unifi/msn/antrop/route/stfr_eng.htm

-K~

Following up on what revbrenda1st mentioned, the Von Luschan's
Cromatic Scale can be found described here:
http://www.unifi.it/unifi/msn/antrop/route/stfr_eng.htm or the direct
image here: http://www.unifi.it/unifi/msn/antrop/route/stru0004.jpg

The scale appears to be numerical though; I didn't see any descriptive
names for the colors.  Moreover, as melatonin levels may vary even
within races, it seems unlikely that a specific racial name would be
associated with any particular hue.

Perhaps someone with a background in Criminology or Forensics may have
a better idea for this.

Thank you very much, indeed, for the rating.

hedgie

I worked with Boots cosmetics in the UK when they did colour matching
of cosmetics on induvidual chemists in the labs hands. We measured the
skin tones of the chemists on a spectrophotometer and were very
suprised that we could identify people by a subsequent measurement and
search of the database.