Blood red Blood red The color blood red is a dark shade of the color red meant to resemble the color of human blood (which is composed of oxygenated red erythrocytes, white leukocytes, and yellow blood plasma). It is the iron in hemoglobin specifically that gives blood its red color. The actual color ranges from crimson to a dark brown-blood depending on how oxygenated the blood is, and may have a slightly orange hue. Deoxygenated blood, which circulates closer to the body's surface and which is therefore generally more likely to be seen than oxygenated blood, issues from bodily veins in a
Blood red wound, and it does not change color upon exposure to air. The color "blood red", therefore, covers both these states: the darker deoxygenated color and the brighter oxygenated one. Also, dried blood often has a darker, rust-colored quality: all dried blood has been oxygenated and then desiccated, causing the cells within it to die. This blood is often darker than either shade of red that can be seen in fresh blood. In the RGB color spectrum blood red often consists only of the color red, with no green or blue component; in the CYMK color model blood red has no