Toon Tone
Ten classic cartoon characters. Five will be picked each round. Recreate their signature color from memory using hue, saturation, and brightness sliders. Scored by Delta E 2000 perceptual difference — 20 points per round, 100 max. Harder than it sounds: most people think they know Elmo's red, but ΔE 3 is further off than you think.
How to play
- Click Start Game to begin round 1 of 5.
- Read the character name. Adjust hue, saturation, and brightness sliders to recreate their signature color from memory.
- Click Submit Guess. The correct color is revealed, and your match is scored by Delta E 2000.
- Repeat for 5 rounds — 20 points each, 100 total maximum.
Why cartoon colors are deceptive
Our memory of familiar colors is influenced by everything we have seen the character in — merchandise, TV, film, adaptations, fan art. The "Elmo red" you remember is actually an average of thousands of slightly different reds across decades of licensed products, most of which are not identical. This is why the game is harder than it sounds: you are not trying to match the cartoon you last saw, you are trying to match a color that lives in a fog of familiar approximations.
The game is scored by Delta E 2000, which is the same metric used by professional color-matching tools. A ΔE of 0 is a perfect match. A ΔE of 1 is roughly the threshold where most people can start noticing a difference. A ΔE of 3 is visibly different but still in the same family. A ΔE of 10 is clearly wrong. Most players score ΔE 5–15 on their first attempt at a familiar character, which is much worse than they expect.
Tips for higher scores
- Match hue first — if you have the wrong hue, no amount of saturation or brightness adjustment will recover the score.
- Bright cartoon colors are usually around 80–100% saturation and 80–100% brightness. Do not go muted unless the character is famously muted (Shrek, Barney).
- Warm characters (Elmo, Mario, Pooh) skew towards the orange-red and golden-yellow hue ranges, not pure red or pure yellow.
- Cool characters (Cookie Monster, Sonic) skew towards a specific blue — Cookie Monster is famously not navy blue despite looking dark on TV.
- Pooh and Homer are both yellows, but Pooh is warmer (more orange) and Homer is more golden. Both are much brighter than they appear on screen.
Frequently asked questions
How does Toon Tone work?
Each round names a cartoon character. You adjust hue, saturation, and brightness sliders to recreate their signature color from memory. When you submit, the correct color is revealed and your guess is scored by Delta E 2000 perceptual difference. Five rounds, 20 points per round, 100 points max. Random subset of characters each play, so no memorization.
What characters are included?
Ten classic cartoon characters: Elmo, Cookie Monster, SpongeBob, Shrek, Barney, the Pink Panther, Winnie the Pooh, Sonic the Hedgehog, Homer Simpson, and Mario. Each has a signature color that most people recognize instantly — or think they do. Getting the exact shade from memory is harder than it looks.
What is Delta E 2000?
Delta E 2000 (ΔE00) is the CIE standard for perceptual color difference. A lower value means a better match: ΔE under 2 is imperceptibly close, under 5 is close, under 10 is noticeable but related, over 10 is clearly wrong. Delta E 2000 accounts for the fact that human eyes are more sensitive to some hue regions than others, so it produces more accurate scores than the older Delta E 1976 metric.
How are the points calculated?
Twenty points per round maximum. Each unit of Delta E costs 2 points, so a perfect match (ΔE 0) is 20 points, ΔE 5 is 10 points, and ΔE 10 or higher is 0 points. Across five rounds, the maximum possible score is 100. Most players score 40–70 on their first play.
Can I share my score?
Yes — after the last round, click Share Score to copy a text result you can paste into any app. The result shows your total score, per-round performance as colored squares, and a link to the game. No accounts, no leaderboards.
Are these the official colors?
No — these are widely-recognized approximations of each character's signature color, not official brand specifications. Character colors are trademarked and officially specified by their owners (Sesame Workshop, Nickelodeon, Disney, Nintendo, etc.). The hex values here are illustrative for the game and are not intended for any commercial reproduction.