Subject:
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Shades of Gray
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.general
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Date:
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Fri, 21 Nov 2003 18:37:34 GMT
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And to give illustration to the phrase, should that be the British "grey" or the
American "gray"? :-)
Jake has used a somewhat perjorative rendering of the no-longer-current gray as
"muddy". It carries the implication that the actual plastic is not up to the
clarity that Lego is known for. In reality, that is not the case. In terms an
artist or photographer would use, it is a "warm" gray. That is, shifted to the
"warm" end of the spectrum (yellow, orange, red), and is more specifically,
yellow-shifted for both the light and dark gray.
Viewed in isolation, it is not a "pure", or more properly "neutral", gray. When
one is talking about the fairly straightforward primary colors that Lego was
long known for, it seems in theory out of step to have a warm gray rather than a
neutral gray, and I think that is what the Lego company and even their test
groups are responding to. Looking at my legions of minifig medieval troops with
warm gray metal weapons and armor, it makes sense to have a neutral gray, or
even a "cool" gray (blue, green, or purple are "cool" colors).
But when one is talking about buildings, roads, stones, rocks, and concrete -
the natural world and the building blocks we make of it - then we are talking
about warm grays. Go out and look at your sidewalk, freeway, or asphault and it
is probably a warm gray or black (yes, you oddballs with red asphault, I've seen
it). In fact, this is a color sensitivity game I play with my son, trying to
get him to look at the road and the clouds and see all the colors that are
there, and not simply call them "gray".
For so much of what people do with Lego, a warm gray is very appropriate. This
is ignoring the compatiblity problems of mixing the old and the new - I suppose
I can actually use it to my advantage as nautural variation in the stone for
medieval structures, but builders of more modern structures will view the mixing
as a problem.
The point I would have to make to Lego is that they view this as an
"improvement". I don't think that is correct - it is merely different. For
some applications it is better, for some it is worse. It would appear that they
didn't really think through the ramifications of the change. Perhaps I do them
a disservice; that they did consider all the issues and felt they had to be true
to themselves regardless. But I still feel that they have merely made a change,
and not an necessarily an improvement.
-->Bruce<--
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Message has 2 Replies:
 | | Re: Shades of Gray
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| (...) It's 'grey'; learn to spell, colonial scum! :P (...) Very well said. I'm not too fussed by the change, but it would be good to have a comprehensive answer to the reasoning behind it. They don't owe us that, though. From what little Jake says (...) (21 years ago, 22-Nov-03, to lugnet.general)
| | | Re: Shades of Gray
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| (...) It doesn't matter which 'color' of 'grey' you're talking about, you're still going to find someone who doesn't like the new 'gray' 'colour'. ;) But seriously.... Bruce, your post is a welcome bit of reason in all of this kafuffle. (...) This (...) (21 years ago, 22-Nov-03, to lugnet.general)
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