Okay, so, I’ve been messing around with colors for my new project, and I got stuck on these two: anthracite and black. They look kinda the same, but not really, you know? So I decided to dig in and see what’s up.
First off, I started looking at them side by side. I used this color picker tool thingy to see what their RGB values were. Turns out, anthracite is 56:62:66. It’s got a bit of blue in it, which I didn’t really notice at first. Black, on the other hand, is just 0:0:0, pure darkness.
Then I went down this rabbit hole of reading about coal. Yeah, I know, sounds random. But it turns out anthracite is a type of coal, the “hard coal” kind. It’s super shiny and has the most carbon of all the coal types. And apparently, in Australia, they call anthracite and some other coals “black coal”.
- Anthracite is like, the top-tier coal.
- It’s hard and shiny.
- It’s got loads of carbon.
I also found out that anthracite isn’t as common as other types of coal. And there’s this other thing called “brown coal” or “lignite” which is like, the opposite – less carbon, more moisture. Who knew there was so much to know about coal, right?
Anyway, back to the colors. Seeing the connection to coal helped me understand why anthracite is the way it is. It’s not just a random gray, it’s got this depth and slight metallic sheen to it, just like the coal. When you put the two colors next to each other, and think about the shiny coal, the difference becomes more obvious.
So, I played around with putting anthracite and black in different combinations. I tried using them as background colors, text colors, and even in some graphics. What I realized is that anthracite works great when you want something dark but not as stark as pure black. It’s softer, more subtle.
In the end, I think I’ve got a better handle on these two colors now. Anthracite isn’t just a fancy word for dark gray. It’s got its own vibe, its own story. And knowing that, I feel like I can use it more intentionally in my designs.
Hope this little experiment of mine helps someone else out there who’s also trying to figure out the whole anthracite vs. black thing! It was a fun little journey for me, and I think it made my color choices a little bit better in the end.
