colors
Back to gallery

Commanding Helix Forest

#3c942b
Notes

Commanding Helix Forest (#3C942B) is a true green with an earthy character. It leans grounded and natural, the kind of color that plays well with wood, clay, linen, and warm neutrals. Its HSL profile (110°, 55%, 37%) places it in the balanced band at a mid lightness. It works across type, buttons, and borders, saturated enough to feel deliberate but balanced enough to not fight the rest of the palette. For a confident two-color system, pair it with its complementary violet. For something softer, pull in its analogous neighbors on either side of the wheel.

HEX
#3c942b
RGB
rgb(60, 148, 43)
HSL
hsl(110, 55%, 37%)
HWB
hwb(110 17% 42%)
OKLCH
oklch(59.1% 0.164 140.7)
P3
color(display-p3 0.3314 0.5729 0.2327)
HSV
hsv(110, 71%, 58%)
LAB
lab(54.36% -46.39 45.57)
LCH
lch(54.36% 65.03 135.51)
CMYK
cmyk(59%, 0%, 71%, 42%)

Etymology

Commanding
adjective

Latin commendāre, to entrust / order — present-participle of command. As a color modifier, commanding implies a saturated-and-authoritative quality where the hue claims visual leadership of its surrounding palette. Sits at the bold-and-authoritative end of the grid, parallel to authoritative and imperial in usage.

Helix
modifier

Greek ἕλιξ, spiral-or-coil. As a color modifier, helix implies a planetary-nebula-and-spiraling-coil quality, the visual register of Helix-Nebula-and-Eye-of-God hand-planetary-nebula-and-spiraling-coil Helix-Nebula-and-Eye-of-God-and-NGC-7293 helix-and-planetary-nebula-and-spiraling-coil surfaces under Helix-Nebula-and-Eye-of-God-and-NGC-7293 Aquarius-and-Hubble-deep-field planetary-nebula-light. Sits at the modifier-and-cosmic end of the grid, parallel to nebula and corona in usage.

Forest
noun

The dense canopy of a temperate or tropical woodland — oak, beech, pine, eucalyptus, mahogany — wherever leaves close above to filter the light below. Forest green refers to the average reflectance of a healthy mid-summer canopy seen from below: a saturated, slightly muted green with the matte finish of layered chlorophyll. Deeper than fern, cooler than olive, with the ecological weight of a word that has named every wooded biome on Earth.

Closest matches

The nearest named color in three reference sources, ranked by perceptual distance (ΔE76 in CIELAB). ΔE < 1 is imperceptible to most viewers; ΔE > 10 is clearly different. When two sources point to the same hex they’re merged into one tile; click any to open that color’s page.

Variations

Click any swatch to explore

Harmonies

Accessibility

Color-vision simulation

How this color appears to viewers with the four major color-vision-deficiency types. Computed via the Machado (2009) physiologically-based model. If a tile matches the original, the color reads the same to that viewer.

#3c942b
Original
#98871b
Protanopia
#8d7f35
Deuteranopia
#308f7f
Tritanopia
#7a7a7a
Achromatopsia
WCAG contrast

The color used as foreground text against pure white and pure black, with the contrast ratio and WCAG 2.1 grade. Aim for AA (4.5:1) for body text and AA Large (3:1) for 18 pt+ headlines; AAA (7:1) is the gold standard for long-form reading surfaces.

The quick brown foxSample body text at normal size. The wcag minimum for body contrast is 4.5:1 (AA) or 7:1 (AAA).
AA Largeon White
3.84:1
The quick brown foxSample body text at normal size. The wcag minimum for body contrast is 4.5:1 (AA) or 7:1 (AAA).
AAon Black
5.46:1

Wide gamut

Display P3 representation

The CSS Color 4 wide-gamut form of this color. Both swatches render the same color on every display — the P3 form only diverges from sRGB when a designer pushes channels outside sRGB's reach.

sRGB hex
sRGB hex
##3C942B
Display P3
Display P3
color(display-p3 0.3314 0.5729 0.2327)
P3 has subtle headroomOKLCH chroma 0.164

Moderately saturated colors gain a small bump in P3 — the difference is usually visible side-by-side on wide-gamut hardware but won't change the character of the color.

Related Colors

Canvas