Abstract
Gold and silver are special colors that generally cannot be identified by physical measurements. This study aims at clarifying the perception mechanism for gold and silver color by a subjective experiment. The dependence of the recognized color on the size of the observation area was examined by placing masks with different aperture sizes on gold and silver objects. One interesting result is that the appearance of a gold (silver) area changes to yellow (gray) when the size of the observation area falls below a threshold. Another result is that the threshold is smaller at peripheral areas that include an object edge than at central areas. This indicates that gold or silver color perception requires the recognition of object configuration, which is easier at the peripheral areas.
