Color Blend - Automatic Color Identifer

[antonyt]

Hey guys,

I've created an application called Color Blend which allows you to identify colors by pointing the camera at an object. I'm decoding the preview stream so I am able to do this continually without manual intervention. I have only been able to test it on a HTC Hero and would really appreciate people who have other devices to download it and comment on performance, camera facilities etc. I'm just choosing the camera preview size closest to the screen resolution but not I'm sure how well that scales to the higher end devices.

Here is the market blurb:
"Point the camera at an object and Color Blend will tell you what color it is in words!
- Fully automated, continual process; no need to press buttons
- Facilities to adjust white balance, brightness, contrast, etc.
- Localised for US and rest of world (colour vs. color!)"

http://img833.imageshack.us/img833/3866/colourblend.png
http://img841.imageshack.us/img841/5290/colourblend2.png

The 'web standard' color scheme contains the 16 W3C standard html named colors. The 'web extended' scheme contains the colors supported by most browsers (based on X11). The 'common' (default) color scheme is a subset of the extended scheme that I randomly chose.

The bar at the bottom is a gradient produced from the past x colors you have seen. You can activate manual mode by pressing on the swirling arrow icon.

All feedback welcome!

QR code image: http://img824.imageshack.us/img824/2340/qrcodez.png

 

[Hrethgir]

Not too shabby! Using it indoors under flouresent lighting, and it's kind of hit and miss, but I blame the light for messing up the colors. Dried it with the LEDs on too, but that was too much light, washed it all out! I'll give it a go outdoors and see what happens.

 

[antonyt]

The results are significantly affected by lighting, but I tried to include camera controls so that you could compensate accordingly. I'm going to keep working improving accuracy in any case!

I've updated the app with a Colour Blindness test (based on Ishihara plates) and created a webpage with more information: http://antonytran.co.uk/colour-blend/

 

[Hrethgir]

Yeah, the area I tried it out in was not only lit by flourecent lights, but not even well lit, as one of the banks of lights was actually out, so I had poor lighting with shadows and all that. DEFINITELY not blaming that on the app, I wasn't giving it a fair chance! Ooo, I should take it down to Lowe's or Home Depot and try it on the paint chip section, they have all kinds of colors that are labled and with excellent lighting!

 

[ssignature]

I'm a tech in the wide format vinyl sing industry working with solvent inkjet CMYK printers. This app has real promise. On my Samsung Facscinate running 2.1, it will not change from RGB to another color space and when I try to adjust the calibration settings my phone reboots. To me, the "word" description of the colors is useless unless it shows Pantone colors. The RGB and CMYK readings are very useful IF I could calibrate my phone. Keep working on it! With a few tweaks and an iPhone (horrors!) version, you could really sell this to people in the digital printing industry.

 

[firegold21]

Downloading it now to give it a try. If it works well, my wife can use it to properly color-match paintings with the intended environment.