True Color?

I finished a small painting project in the back entry and took some pictures to commemorate the fresh paint before the activities of life ding and scratch it back up again.  It didn't seem to matter what type of light I used, halogen, incandescent, camera flash.  Each time the color came out not quite matching what my eyes saw.  It made me wonder how accurate digital cameras really are at capturing colors correctly.  My dad had dabbled in photography when he was younger, and he had said that the best color film could be judged by the quality and accuracy of matching something yellow.  For my camera, its nemesis appears to be Valspar's Deep Blue Ocean paint.  It is both blue and green, and the camera seems to make it an either/or choice depending on the lighting and exposure.  Perhaps it is yet another item to add to the digital vs. analog debate.

The new paint image as captured with camera flash.

It looks too green, not a match.

This time with overhead entry light, halogen, blurry longer exposure.  Now it looks blue, still not a match.

This is with incandescent worklight, and halogen overhead light.

Still too green, but a little closer, maybe.

The next shot with incandecent worklight and overhead halogen was the best the camera could manage.

It is pretty close, but lacks the brightness of the real thing.

Even on the dark side of the house (north facing entry), the blue is really bright; it is a make you want to go to a tropical beach bright.

So I tried putting the paint sample chip on the scanner,

and it gave me this.

So it would appear the scanner has a problem too,

because the scan did not match the chip.

After playing with the image settings,

this is as close as it gets to what appears on the wall.

It would appear that in digital photography a bold blue-green is just as elusive as the perfect yellow was back in the days of film.