RYB Color Model

RYB Color Model

RYB (an abbreviation of red-yellow-blue) is a historical set of colors used in subtractive color mixing, and is one commonly used set of primary colors. It is primarily used in art and design education, particularly painting.

It predates much of modern scientific color theory, which has demonstrated that magenta, yellow, and cyan is the best set of three colorants to combine, for the widest range of high-chroma colors. Red can be produced by mixing magenta and yellow, blue can be produced by mixing cyan and magenta, and green can be produced by mixing yellow and cyan. In the RYB model, red takes the place of magenta, and blue takes the place of cyan.

However, reproducing the entire range of human color vision with three primaries either in an additive or subtractive fashion is generally not possible; see gamut for more information.