Monochromasie

Monochromasie is a term used in several fields to describe the property of presenting or comprising a single color or a single wavelength of light. The word derives from Greek monos meaning one and chroma meaning color.

In optics and spectroscopy, monochromasie refers to light that is essentially of one wavelength. Real-world sources approximate this with lasers or with narrow-band filters, with lasers providing highly monochromatic beams while broad-spectrum sources are filtered to reduce spectral width.

In the arts and visual media, monochromasie describes works that use variations of a single hue, or a grayscale, rather than a full color palette. Such monochrome or single-hue palettes are used to emphasize form, contrast, mood, or symbolism.

In ophthalmology and vision science, monochromasie or monochromacy denotes a severe form of color vision deficiency in which an individual perceives only one color channel or grayscale. True monochromacy is rare and results from the absence or malfunction of cone photoreceptors; more common conditions such as achromatopsia and certain forms of cone monochromacy reduce color perception.

In imaging and printing, monochromasie can refer to monochrome imaging where pixels are encoded with intensity information in a single color channel, or to the technique of rendering color images in grayscale.