Revisiting The Optical Society Of America Uniform Color Scales System: Past, Present And Future Challenges

As a tribute to Claudio Oleari (1944-2018), in this article we remember some of his ideas about the role of physics and engineering in modern colour science. In particular, we consider his emphasis on the strong content of the work carried out during 1947-1974 by the Committee on Uniform Scales of the Optical Society of America. Oleari considered the Optical Society of America Uniform Color Scales system a very useful basis for new developments in colour science, including approximately uniform colour spaces, colour difference formulae and chromatic adaptation transforms. Papers published by Oleari and colleagues constitute an original alternative approach to the current generalised assumption of CIELAB made by most researchers and practitioners of colour science. We should seek a deeper understanding of colour vision to allow the development of new colour spaces, in which colour appearance could be more neatly expressed.