How do printers mix colors together? This is the question I had one day as I was changing the ink cartridge on my printer. I noticed that there are really only three colors in the cartridge. But I can print beautiful full color photographs. I wondered how this is possible and went in search of color ink info.
The three colors in the color ink cartridge were, I thought, blue, red and yellow. In reality I guess they are called cyan, magenta and yellow. Magenta is kind of a pinkish red and cyan is an intense, light blue. It turns out these three shades can be used to mix any color. For instance, if you want green the printer mixes cyan and yellow. Different tints of green involve different proportions of the two colors, maybe with a hint of magenta thrown in.
Black ink is mixed in to make it darker. In the same way, magenta and yellow go together to make orange, and cyan and magenta go together to make purple. All three of the colors can be mixed to make black, but most color printers have actual black ink because they need so much of it and do not want to waste the color ink.
Apparently this is the same way artists mix paint and have for thousands of years. An artist has to learn which colors mix together to make other colors, and how to control it on their palette. It is funny how this ancient art that requires much knowledge is something we now program our machines to do for us.