Saturation

The saturation of a color is the intensity of a color, or if you'd prefer, the degree of difference that a color varies from gray of the same brightness (or lightness). A color that is fully saturated means that the color is at full intensity, such as a slightly dark red represented by #BB0000. If this red were to be fully desaturated, its value would be #BBBBBB. This means that to desaturate the color #BB0000 we would have to bring the values for blue and green from 00 to BB.

As a color gets closer and closer to a value on the gray scale, it becomes desaturated. To desaturate #00CC00, the values for green and blue must be brought closer to the value for red. For instance, #22CC22 is a less saturated version of #00CC00. #99CC99 is even less saturated still. Finally, the color will become completely desaturated, with the value #CCCCCC.

Decreasing the saturation of a color can be determined by moving closer to the center of the circle in the same hue.



As shown in the above image, to decrease the saturation of cyan, you would move closer to the center of the circle along the 180° line. A saturation value of 50% would be the color halfway between cyan and white.

It is important to note that when a color is fully desaturated, it has no hue.





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