Feeling Blue?

February 8, 2021 9:39 AM

You're in luck because there's a new Blue to be: YInMn, the first new blue in 2 centuries Turns out there's a lot to be said about Blue
posted by OHenryPacey (44 comments total)

I remember reading about this when it was first discovered, but didn't know it had been approved for any use at all. It's really a beautiful color, and I'm glad it's available. I don't know what I'd do with it, but now I feel like I need to invent a project just to use this.
posted by hippybear at 9:45 AM on February 8, 2021

Now that it's more widely available, just our luck, a few years down the road, it'll be discovered that exposure to this unnatural material will have side effects like immortality, irresistable charisma, or the ability to manifest chocolate at will.
posted by otherchaz at 9:56 AM on February 8, 2021 [3 favorites]

It's blue all right, but it's no Yves Klein Blue
posted by chavenet at 10:04 AM on February 8, 2021 [6 favorites]

Editor’s note 1/27/21 12:50pm EST: An earlier version of this article identified YInMn as the first shade of blue created in 200 years. However, it is instead the first inorganic blue pigment invented in the same time frame.
posted by lalochezia at 10:09 AM on February 8, 2021 [1 favorite]

A dry powder version has not yet been approved for public consumption

ಠ_ಠ
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 10:12 AM on February 8, 2021 [9 favorites]

CHOP A LINE NOW
posted by thelonius at 10:12 AM on February 8, 2021 [2 favorites]

My partner and I were talking about this yesterday. I don't understand the difference between something being "actually blue" and being blue just because of light refraction. We talked it over, things we'd learned in various contexts (he had read a thing about Bluejays actually being brown, but we see them as blue because of the way their feathers reflect light) and it just makes my brain hurt.

It's a beautiful color blue. I'm going to buy some paint or crayons or something in that color.
posted by Orlop at 10:17 AM on February 8, 2021 [2 favorites]

But is it Hooloovoo blue?
posted by zengargoyle at 10:18 AM on February 8, 2021 [2 favorites]

Yeah, new blue. That's cool. When do we finally get our hands on Squant?
posted by SansPoint at 10:19 AM on February 8, 2021 [4 favorites]

Editor’s note 1/27/21 12:50pm EST: An earlier version of this article identified YInMn as the first shade of blue created in 200 years. However, it is instead the first inorganic blue pigment invented in the same time frame.

I was looking at philosophy blogs last week, and some of them were well-actually-ing about this. I guess they were heard!
posted by thelonius at 10:20 AM on February 8, 2021

Plz make scarf and yummy sweater and also socks.
posted by lextex at 10:29 AM on February 8, 2021

What's interesting about it is that initial paint availability shows it to be less strongly tinting than ultramarine or cobalt blue, and only comparably as saturated, while still being massively expensive. So it's still a gimmick pigment. Cobalt blue is toxic, so as a replacement it's worth some more money, but synthetic ultramarine is still cheaper, just as safe, and just as potent.

That said, the art world is a parasite on the automotive world's pigment consumption. Any pigment produced purely for the art world is produced in tiny quantities compared to any other application; once YlnMin is produced in industrial quantities, it'll likely become much, much than ultramarine, which is still a very expensive pigment in art terms.
posted by fatbird at 10:31 AM on February 8, 2021 [2 favorites]

Realizing I can't really generate an opinion of a color seen on this early-aughts plasma TV I use as a screen...
posted by justinethanmathews at 10:45 AM on February 8, 2021

I initially thought this was a double on the Pepsi Blue relaunch. If these people are not all working together, they need a better marketing strategy.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 10:53 AM on February 8, 2021 [2 favorites]

I’m always feeling, YlnMn
posted by Going To Maine at 11:02 AM on February 8, 2021

OK but what is YInMn in the YCbCr colorspace?
posted by 7segment at 11:16 AM on February 8, 2021 [2 favorites]

fatbird: "So it's still a gimmick pigment"

This is just to say that "gimmick pigment" would make a swell username
posted by chavenet at 11:22 AM on February 8, 2021 [2 favorites]

It's very pretty, especially in its glossy form. I want to paint my house with it.
posted by Joe in Australia at 11:26 AM on February 8, 2021

i believe chavenet already alluded, but i'm still scratching my head over why this isn't just international klein blue - created in 1960 (which my best estimate puts at less than two centuries ago).
posted by rude.boy at 11:26 AM on February 8, 2021

why this isn't just international klein blue - created in 1960

IKB is made from "a combination of a colourless polyvinyl acetate resin called Rhodopas M60A ... , a dash of alcohol and ultramarine pigment".

"The major component of lazurite [i.e. ultramarine] is a complex sulfur-containing sodium-silicate (Na8–10Al6Si6O24S2–4), which makes ultramarine the most complex of all mineral pigments"

YInMn is a novel pigment (i.e. the color-bearing substance itself) that happens to produce a similar color as IKB and ultramarine. It is very different, chemically-speaking.
posted by jedicus at 12:04 PM on February 8, 2021 [4 favorites]

OK but what is YInMn in the YCbCr colorspace?

Y 0.3 CB 0.15 CR -0.0 apparently

Also, #2e5090, rgb(46,80,144), and hsl(219, 52%, 37%
posted by ChurchHatesTucker at 12:10 PM on February 8, 2021

It looks like the main benefit, aside from being nontoxic, is that it doesn't fade like most blues.

Per the article there already is a crayon "inspired by" it.

It kind of gives me the same feeling as some LED Christmas lights...a little too intense, like it's pushing on my eyeballs.
posted by emjaybee at 12:11 PM on February 8, 2021 [2 favorites]

what is YInMn in the YCbCr colorspace

Does YInMn translate to common colorspaces, or are the translations to hex, rgb, etc. just approximations when seen through the colorspaces available on our computer screens?
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 12:43 PM on February 8, 2021

Along the lines of what I mean: I Can't Show You How Pink This Pink Is
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 12:46 PM on February 8, 2021 [1 favorite]

"a combination of a colourless polyvinyl acetate resin called Rhodopas M60A ... , a dash of alcohol and ultramarine pigment".

I thought IKB was made from kaolin, but you're right and I'm not completely wrong, in the fine print synthetic ultramarine has some kaolin in it.

I have a small Lazurite pebble on my desk. It's very pretty.
posted by ovvl at 1:23 PM on February 8, 2021

The most important question is is it biodegradable? What is its lifecycle in the environment?
posted by monotreme at 2:17 PM on February 8, 2021 [1 favorite]

A safety materials sheet from a paint company says not biodegradable.
posted by They sucked his brains out! at 3:04 PM on February 8, 2021 [1 favorite]

> An earlier version of this article identified YInMn as the first shade of blue created in 200 years. However, it is instead the first inorganic blue pigment invented in the same time frame.

Now I am wondering how this pigment compares to phthalocyanine blue, an organic blue pigment developed in the 1920-30s. It is stable and has high tinting strength. To the best of my knowledge, it "solves" the shortcomings of earlier blue pigments, at least from an industrial perspective.

The academic paper [scihub link] doesn't make a comparison either. Maybe the reason they are not comparable is obvious?
posted by scose at 3:40 PM on February 8, 2021

(Was I the only one who thought 'new Blue' referred to a metafilter-like website?)

(And YInMn.com. The asking price is a cool $5795.)
posted by Insert Clever Name Here at 3:47 PM on February 8, 2021

Wonder if they'll make a tattoo ink out of it
posted by museum of fire ants at 3:47 PM on February 8, 2021 [2 favorites]

It appears to this amateur that phthalocyanine blue is organic, and thus will degrade over time in various ways. But it's pretty inert overall, and apparently is even used in some toothpastes.

I think the way organic pigments work with reflecting light might be different from inorganic pigments in ways that matter on some level? But I'm an amateur and my basic gloss about these matters has not really educated me at all.

I guess you can only get the new paint mixed to order in small, artist-size batches. You have to contact the company and fill out a questionnaire and then probably wait 6 weeks to get your paint.

I wonder how much a small tube of it costs?!?
posted by hippybear at 3:53 PM on February 8, 2021

Can I get it mimeograph ink? I want to make some nostalgic avant-garde street leaflets.
posted by achrise at 4:27 PM on February 8, 2021

I don't understand the difference between something being "actually blue" and being blue just because of light refraction.

Wikipedia on pigment vs structural coloration might help clear that up a little. Note that structural coloration is due more to reflection and diffraction than refraction.

While it's arguable that anything that looks blue in white light is actually blue, another reasonable way to define "actually blue" is as a property of things that remain blue even when you crush them into such a fine powder as to destroy all physical structure they possess at scales comparable to the wavelength of blue light; the blueness is a chemical property of the substance itself rather than of the shape it happens to be formed into.
posted by flabdablet at 4:55 PM on February 8, 2021 [6 favorites]

anything that looks blue in white light is actually blue

Emphasis mine
posted by achrise at 5:12 PM on February 8, 2021

And as usual there are exceptions.
posted by flabdablet at 5:31 PM on February 8, 2021 [1 favorite]

So I signed up. I guess once they get enough expressed interest they'll do a big batch as a custom run and then divide it up according to what amounts people want.

Might be spendy. Will be spendy. Expecting it to be lovely.
posted by hippybear at 7:45 PM on February 8, 2021

"Thank you very much for signing up to be notified about our Custom Lab small batches of YInMn Blue. We will be e-mailing you regarding availability and pricing in the coming weeks. "
posted by hippybear at 7:46 PM on February 8, 2021

Gamblin did a batch of oil paint using this blue and only sold it direct from their factory store for $75. Until the raw pigment cost comes down, you’re not likely to see this in many, if any, retail art supply stores.
posted by jimw at 7:57 PM on February 8, 2021

Nope, I've signed up to be part of a special batch. I'm sure it will cost way more than I want it to, but it will be fun to have a bit of it to play with.
posted by hippybear at 8:03 PM on February 8, 2021

You can scroll down here to get a short form to sign up saying "yeah, I"ll buy some, tell me when you decide to make a batch and how much it will cost"
posted by hippybear at 8:05 PM on February 8, 2021

If this is so new how come I've seen stuff like it before?
posted by turbid dahlia at 8:10 PM on February 8, 2021

Because it was available industrially years earlier and is just now being released for consumer use?

Also, maybe what you saw before was similar but wasn't actually this because this actually IS new.
posted by hippybear at 8:19 PM on February 8, 2021

Wikipedia on Blue:

Why the sky and sea appear blue
...
The sea is seen as blue for largely the same reason: the water absorbs the longer wavelengths of red and reflects and scatters the blue, which comes to the eye of the viewer.

This is a really long-winded way to say that the reason the sea looks blue is that water is blue. Unlike air, which preferentially scatters blue light off sideways and lets red just plough straight on through, water scatters and reflects blues and absorbs reds just like any other dye would do.

It's just not a very intense blue, so it takes a fair thickness of it for its colour to be perceptible.
posted by flabdablet at 11:25 PM on February 8, 2021 [1 favorite]

Well, I'd hoped to have heard back from the paint company with details on pricing and quantities and stuff before this thread closed... but that didn't happen.

Maybe I will hear from them and maybe I will get some of this interesting pigmented paint. But for now, I am just waiting for an email.
posted by hippybear at 9:02 AM on March 7, 2021 [1 favorite]