Seasons
Season comparisons: which of the two am I?
By the Skintonic team · SKINTONIC LLC · Updated
Almost nobody is torn between a light spring and a deep winter. The confusion is always between neighbors — two seasons that share three of the four factors and differ on one, which is enough to look identical in a mirror and want different colors in a shop.
- Undertone
- 4 pairs
- Depth
- 5 pairs
- Contrast
- 3 pairs
- Chroma
- 6 pairs
These 18 pages each take one of those pairs, name the single factor that separates them, and give you three tests for that factor specifically. Which pairs get a page is worked out from the season data itself: each season's two nearest neighbors by undertone, depth, contrast and chroma, plus the handful of pairs people ask about most, including two that are not close at all and are confused precisely because they share a depth.
What separates each pair
Four factors do all the work, and every pair below is split by exactly one of them. The count tells you something on its own: 4 of the 18 come down to undertone, 5 of the 18 come down to depth, 3 of the 18 come down to contrast, 6 of the 18 come down to chroma.
Undertone pairs are the ones that cost you most to get wrong, because the two palettes disagree about almost every color rather than about the ends of a scale. Depth and contrast pairs are gentler — most of the two lists overlap, and what changes is how far toward an extreme you can go. Chroma pairs are the hardest to settle in a mirror and the easiest to settle with a photograph.
Every comparison
- Warm Autumn vs Warm Spring Separated by chroma: muted against clear.
- Bright Winter vs Deep Winter Separated by depth: medium against deep.
- Cool Summer vs Cool Winter Separated by contrast: medium against strong.
- Deep Autumn vs Warm Autumn Separated by chroma: moderate against muted.
- Bright Spring vs Warm Spring Separated by contrast: strong against medium.
- Light Summer vs Soft Summer Separated by depth: light against medium.
- Bright Spring vs Deep Autumn Separated by chroma: clear against moderate.
- Light Spring vs Warm Spring Separated by depth: light against medium.
- Cool Winter vs Deep Winter Separated by chroma: clear against moderate.
- Deep Autumn vs Soft Autumn Separated by depth: deep against medium.
- Cool Summer vs Light Summer Separated by depth: medium against light.
- Cool Summer vs Soft Summer Separated by chroma: moderate against muted.
- Bright Spring vs Light Spring Separated by contrast: strong against soft.
- Light Spring vs Soft Autumn Separated by chroma: clear against muted.
- Bright Spring vs Bright Winter Separated by undertone: warm against cool.
- Soft Autumn vs Soft Summer Separated by undertone: warm against cool.
- Deep Autumn vs Deep Winter Separated by undertone: warm against cool.
- Light Spring vs Light Summer Separated by undertone: warm against cool.
The order is by how close the two seasons actually sit in the four-factor space, nearest first. The pairs at the top of the list are the ones where either palette will serve you reasonably well; the ones at the bottom look alike in a mirror for a quite different reason — they share a depth, so they read as the same brightness of person, while wanting opposite undertones.
Or skip the comparison
The scan measures all four factors from one photo and gives you the answer directly, along with a preview of your colors. It is free, there is no account, and the photo never leaves your browser.
All 12 seasons · Color analysis quiz · Check a single color · Color combinations