ITPEC IP April 2022 Question 24
With regard to the colors printed by a printer, theoretically, what color is formed when cyan, magenta, and yellow are mixed together by subtractive color mixing?
Explanation
Black — in subtractive mixing each ink removes one primary colour of light, and the three inks together remove all of it.
Printer ink works by absorbing part of the light and reflecting the rest:
- •Cyan absorbs red
- •Magenta absorbs green
- •Yellow absorbs blue
Mixing all three absorbs red, green and blue, so no light is reflected and the result is, in theory, black. Real inks give a muddy dark brown instead, which is why printers add a separate black ink, the K in CMYK.
Answer (c)
Why not others:
- •(a) Blue — cyan and magenta only: together they absorb red and green and leave blue; yellow is missing
- •(b) Red — magenta and yellow only, leaving red; cyan is missing
- •(d) Green — cyan and yellow only, leaving green; magenta is missing
Key rule: Additive mixing of light (RGB, displays) builds towards white; subtractive mixing of ink (CMY, printers) builds towards black, and any two subtractive primaries give one additive primary.
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