Responsibility and scope

ARBE λ* is an independent research and communication project. It is initiated and maintained by an individual practitioner working at the intersection of colour, physics, and design.

This project does not represent an organisation, association, or standardisation body. All content reflects a personal, research-driven perspective shared openly for discussion, learning, and further development.

Origin and continuity

Over many years, open colour initiatives such as freieFarbe demonstrated that colour does not need to be locked into proprietary systems in order to function.

While organisational structures may end, the questions behind them often remain. ARBE λ* continues this line of inquiry independently — not as a successor, but under the same fundamental premise of open, calculable colour.

Motivation

Practical work with colour across different media, materials, and production processes reveals a recurring challenge: visual matching alone is not sufficient.

What is often missing is a way to describe colour behaviour itself — beyond appearance, brand references, or isolated samples.

ARBE λ* emerged from the need to better understand why colours behave differently under changing conditions, and how this behaviour can be described in a transparent and reproducible way.

Conceptual foundation

Established colour models such as CIELAB and RGB provide reliable frameworks for perceptual description and digital colour handling.

ARBE λ* complements these models by introducing a physically grounded metric based on the balance between absorption and reflection.

This perspective makes it possible to discuss colour not only as an appearance, but also as a state of light and energy — especially relevant when comparing colours across materials, processes, and lighting environments.

Position

We believe the future lies in freely accessible, mathematically defined colour models such as CIELAB and RGB, complemented by physically grounded metrics like ARBE λ*, which describe colour not only perceptually but also in terms of light and energy.

ARBE λ* is not proposed as a replacement for existing colour models, but as an extension that adds physical context to perceptual descriptions.

Transparency

arbe-lambda-star.com is an independent project. It is not a legal successor of any former association and does not claim institutional authority.

All materials are shared in the spirit of open inquiry, without proprietary constraints.