Modeling the Appearance of Fluorescent Colors

The advent of improved durability pigments has resulted in the increased use of fluorescent colored materials in safety and warning applications (e.g., high-priority traffic signs; safety vests). Yet, little is known about the relationship between the visual effectiveness of fluorescent colored materials and their photometric properties. Archival data sets were reanalyzed to assess the appropriateness of an elegant psychophysical model of the appearance of fluorescent colors first introduced by Schultze (1953). The results indicated that the expression Y/MacAdam Limit (x,y) provided an excellent prediction of the suprathreshold appearance of fluorescent color (x,y); where (x,y) represented the color of the test stimulus in 1931 CIE chromaticity coordinates. These findings have important implications for design using fluorescent colors and may also contribute significantly to our understanding of related color phenomena.