Menu
Home
People
Places
Arts
History
Plants & Animals
Science
Life & Culture
Technology
Reference.org
CIELAB color space
open-in-new
<p>The CIELAB color space, also referred to as <i>L*a*b*</i>, is a <a href="/facts/Color_space/zFvEyfHv">color space</a> defined by the <a href="/facts/International_Commission_on_Illumination/46q6W1zk">International Commission on Illumination</a> (abbreviated CIE) in 1976. It expresses color as three values: <i>L*</i> for perceptual lightness and <i>a*</i> and <i>b*</i> for the four <a href="/facts/Unique_hues/fhnTSulg">unique colors</a> of human vision: red, green, blue and yellow. CIELAB was intended as a <a href="/facts/Perceptually_uniform/WhQyyzQ9">perceptually uniform</a> space, where a given numerical change corresponds to a similar perceived change in color. While the LAB space is not truly perceptually uniform, it nevertheless is useful in industry for detecting small differences in color. </p><p>Like the <a href="/facts/CIE_1931_color_space/fzgwzV8V">CIEXYZ</a> space it derives from, CIELAB color space is a device-independent, "standard observer" model. The colors it defines are not relative to any particular device such as a computer monitor or a printer, but instead relate to the <a href="/facts/CIE_1931_color_space/fzgwzV8V">CIE standard observer</a> which is an averaging of the results of color matching experiments under laboratory conditions. </p>