Three tubes, every color
A painter with only red, yellow, and blue can mix orange, green, purple — nearly any hue. Color mixing is that magic: from three primaries you conjure the whole rainbow, no need for a tube of every shade.
Three colors, many more
Red, yellow, and blue are the primary colors — you can't mix them from others, but you can mix them to make the secondary colors orange, green, and purple.
Simulation · Color mixer
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Color 1
Color 2
red + yellow = orange
Pick two primaries and see what they make. Try red + blue.
Lab · Predict, then check
- Guess what red + yellow will make.
- Set the mixer to red and yellow.
- Now try blue + yellow and red + blue.
What you should see: red + yellow = orange, blue + yellow = green, red + blue = purple.