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Sparking Camel

#d4a539
Notes

Sparking Camel (#D4A539) is a true amber with a warm character. It leans warm, pulling light toward red, orange, and yellow. Naturally inviting, it suits editorial and hospitality contexts. Its HSL profile (42°, 64%, 53%) 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 azure. For something softer, pull in its analogous neighbors on either side of the wheel.

HEX
#d4a539
RGB
rgb(212, 165, 57)
HSL
hsl(42, 64%, 53%)
HWB
hwb(42 22% 17%)
OKLCH
oklch(74.7% 0.133 84.3)
HSV
hsv(42, 73%, 83%)
LAB
lab(70.32% 6.79 59.67)
LCH
lch(70.32% 60.05 83.51)
CMYK
cmyk(0%, 22%, 73%, 17%)

Etymology

Sparking
adjective

Old English spearca, spark — present-participle of spark. As a color modifier, sparking implies a saturated-and-electrical-emission quality, the bright color of welding-arc-and-Tesla-coil high-voltage spark-discharge emission. Sits at the bright-and-electric end of the grid, parallel to flashing and coruscating in usage.

Camel
noun

The natural color of Camelus-coat hair — particularly the soft undercoat shed by Bactrian camels in the steppe spring, gathered for centuries for fine wool weaving. The color is undyed camel-hair coat fabric: a warm, slightly muted tan with the silky finish of natural fiber. Lighter than tan, warmer than khaki, with the Mongolian and Central Asian textile heritage of the word.

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

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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.

#d4a539
Original
#b9a529
Protanopia
#c5b13e
Deuteranopia
#e6968f
Tritanopia
#a7a7a7
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).
Failon White
2.27:1
The quick brown foxSample body text at normal size. The wcag minimum for body contrast is 4.5:1 (AA) or 7:1 (AAA).
AAAon Black
9.24:1

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