People in the field of web development and computer graphic design have long been familiar with "color pickers." A color picker is a a tool that allows you to select the hue, saturation and lightness (also sometimes called luminance) of a color for inclusion in your design. This color picker is the reverse of a color picker tool; in this game, the computer is going to pick a color for you. Your job is to accurately identify the hue (where it is located on the color spectrum) the saturation (where does the color lie on the spectrum from fully gray to fully colored?) and lightness (where does the color lie on the dark/bright spectrum?).

How to Play

When you begin the game, the computer will show you a swatch (a rectangular region filled in with a color). Below the swatch will be three slider-bars. The bars represent the color's hue, saturation and lightness. Your job will be try to match the color by selecting each component. You will first select a hue, then a saturation, and then a lightness. When you have selected all three, the computer will tell you which of the components are in the right "ballpark," and you will have the opportunity to adjust each slider. This continues until you are "close enough" on all three sliders.

Scoring

You will be given ten swatches, and for each swatch you start with ten points. Each time you have to fix a slider, you lose one point. It is not possible to earn a negative score for any swatch. Any time you are very close on the first try (for any of the three components) you can earn bonus points. If you are exactly correct, you will earn 5 bonus points. Thus, each swatch is worth 25 possible points (if you get it exactly correct on the first try). 

Setup

There are three setup options for this game.

Ballpark

The ballpark option lets you determine how close you have to be to the actual value in order to be considered "correct". In the novice option, for example, you are considered correct if you are less than 25% off from the actual saturation. In the "Guru" setting, you must be much more accurate.

Limit Extremes

Sometimes it is very difficult to recognize hues when the saturation and lightness are at extreme values. For people who have difficulty differentiating extremes, set this to a higher value.

Guide Lines

Guide lines are tick-marks along the sliders that serve as comparison benchmarks. Fewer guide lines makes the game harder. The hue slider will always have tick-marks for red, yellow, green, cyan, blue, and violet, regardless of this setting.