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Friday, October 22, 2010

Paper: Cyan Haunted House Vignette

Haunted House: Paper, tea lights, feather boa, fake spider web


This haunted house photo has been saturated with blue, resembling a cyanoprint. Checking on a cyan fact, I ran across some spooky information on the color

CYAN:

Cyanoprint - a technique of photography developed about 160 years ago that used a mixture of chemicals including Prussian Blue pigment and no silver.

Prussian Blue was one of the first synthetic pigments and is called: Parisian Blue, Berlin Blue and Cyan. From Prussian Blue was derived Prussic Acid and ferrocyanide, (meaning a blue substance with iron in it).
It is used in photography, blueprints, paint and inks.

On an electronic display device, it is called Electric Cyan. Printing ink is Process Cyan. Add white to it and you are back to Electric Cyan.

Web Color Aqua is another name for Electric Cyan.
Cyan has been called, "Aqua" since 1598, because it looks like tropical water. That is why it is used to paint the bottoms of swimming pools.

Some cyanides are toxic and some are not. In plants, cyanides are found in seeds, like almonds and stones such as peaches and defend the plant against herbivores, though in minute amounts. Cyanides are produced by some algae, bacteria and fungi. The popular blue-green algae owes it's color to these compounds.

The most dangerous is hydrogen cyanide and it's derivative salts.

Lack of oxygen results in cyanosis, because the skin turns blue.


Kyanos is the Greek word for dark blue, from which the word comes.

Is cyan a beautiful color of aquamarine blue, the sweet scent of almonds, or deadly poison? You decide. Mmmmwwwhhhaaahhhhaaahaaaa.