Color analysis of ancient Egyptian paintings and its applications in modern digital visualization

Abstract

This study aims to identify the color preferences of ancient Egyptian paintings and their cultural and historical reasons through color analysis, and consequently introduce a color collection of ancient Egyptian painting colors for color matching of modern digital images. A total of 134 original and 168 replica/repair painting samples were selected from the digital repositories of various authoritative museum collections, focusing on painting patterns formed on object surfaces using coloring agents. The collected samples, spanning from the Ancient Kingdom of Egypt to the Greco‐Roman period, encompass distinct types of ancient Egyptian paintings. The diversity and chronological distribution of these samples suggest that the color use in ancient Egyptian paintings is closely linked to the burial culture, coffin decoration, religious beliefs, and policy changes. Color analysis of the collected samples using the natural color system revealed that the predominant colors in ancient Egyptian paintings tend to be in the red and yellow spectrum, while the blue, green, and purple spectrum is relatively less prominent. This can be attributed to the historical development of colors, the scarcity of mineral resources, and the symbolic significance of colors in ancient Egyptian culture. Finally, a collection of ancient Egyptian painting colors was selected from extracted colors based on color differences to reflect the color characteristics of ancient Egyptian paintings. Furthermore, the construction method of color palettes with different thematic images and the practical application of these palettes in digital patterns using the proposed color collection were demonstrated to offer a reference for designers.