Complementary colors the complementary wavelength to produce a neutral color (gray or white). Color printing, like painting, also uses subtractive colors, but the complementary colors are different from those used in painting. As a result, the same logic applies as to colors produced by light. Color printing uses the CMYK color model, making colors by overprinting cyan, magenta, yellow, and black ink. In printing the most common complementary colors are magenta–green, yellow–blue, and cyan–red. In terms of complementary/opposite colors, this model gives exactly the same result as using the RGB model. Black is added when needed to make the colors darker. The
Natural Color System more colors (184 light colors and 16 in the blue-green space) were added, adding to the current 1950 colors in the NCS 1950 standard colors. Colors that have a representation in the NCS 1950 samples are denoted with a leading capital "S", for example NCS S 1070-Y10R (a chromatic, slightly reddish yellow). The most important difference between NCS and most other color systems resides in their starting points. The aim of NCS is to define colors from their visual appearance, as they are experienced by human consciousness. Other color models, such as CMYK and RGB, are based on an understanding