Chromatic, a word ultimately derived from the Greek noun χρῶμα (''khrṓma''), which means "complexion" or "color", and then from the Greek adjective χρωματικός (''khrōmatikós''; "colored"), may refer to:

In music

* Chromatic scale, the western-tempered twelve-tone scale *

Chromatic chord Chromaticism is a compositional technique interspersing the primary diatonic scale, diatonic pitch (music), pitches and chord (music), chords with other pitches of the chromatic scale. In simple terms, within each octave, diatonic music uses o ...

, chords built from tones chromatically altered from the native scale of the musical composition *

Chromaticism Chromaticism is a compositional technique interspersing the primary diatonic scale, diatonic pitch (music), pitches and chord (music), chords with other pitches of the chromatic scale. In simple terms, within each octave, diatonic music uses o ...

, the use of chromatic scales, chords, and modulations *

Total chromatic In music, a tone row or note row (german: Reihe or '), also series or set, is a non-repetitive ordering of a set of pitch-classes, typically of the twelve notes in musical set theory of the chromatic scale, though both larger and smaller sets a ...

, the use of all twelve pitches of the chromatic scale in tonal music *

Chromatic fantasia A chromatic fantasia is a specific type of fantasia (or fantasy or fancy) originating in sixteenth-century Europe. In its earliest form, it is based on a chromatically descending tetrachord which arises naturally out of the dorian mode. Consequen ...

, a specific form of fantasia originating in sixteenth century Europe *The Chromatic button accordion *The

chromatic harmonica The chromatic harmonica is a type of harmonica that uses a button-activated sliding bar to redirect air from the hole in the mouthpiece to the selected reed-plate desired. When the button is not pressed, an altered diatonic major scale of the key ...

* Chromatic genus, a genus of divisions of the tetrachord characterized by an upper interval of a minor third *

Diatonic and chromatic Diatonic and chromatic are terms in music theory that are most often used to characterize scales, and are also applied to musical instruments, intervals, chords, notes, musical styles, and kinds of harmony. They are very often used as a pair, ...

, as a property of several structures, genres, and other features in music, often contrasted with ''diatonic'' * Chromatics (band), an American electronic music band *'' Chromatica'', the sixth studio album by American singer

Lady Gaga Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta ( ; born March 28, 1986), known professionally as Lady Gaga, is an American singer, songwriter, and actress. She is known for her image reinventions and musical versatility. Gaga began performing as a teenag ...

In optics, vision, and color

* Colorimetry, the science of

color Color (American English) or colour (British English) is the visual perceptual property deriving from the spectrum of light interacting with the photoreceptor cells of the eyes. Color categories and physical specifications of color are associ ...

is sometimes called ''chromatics'' * Chromaticity, the quality of a color as determined by its "purity" and dominant wavelength *

Chromatic aberration In optics, chromatic aberration (CA), also called chromatic distortion and spherochromatism, is a failure of a lens to focus all colors to the same point. It is caused by dispersion: the refractive index of the lens elements varies with the wave ...

, departures from perfect imaging in optics systems due to dispersion * Chromatic dispersion, the dispersion of light due to differing refraction index for different wavelengths * RG Chromaticity, a two-dimensional color space in which there is no color intensity information * Chromatic adaptation, the ability for some organisms to perceive objects similarly in varying lighting conditions

In mathematics

* Chromatic polynomial, a polynomial which encodes the number of different ways to vertex color a graph using ''n'' colors * Chromatic numbering * Chromatic index *

Acyclic chromatic number In graph theory, an acyclic coloring is a (proper) vertex coloring in which every 2-chromatic subgraph is acyclic. The acyclic chromatic number of a graph is the fewest colors needed in any acyclic coloring of . Acyclic coloring is often as ...

Strong chromatic number In graph theory, a strong coloring, with respect to a partition of the vertices into (disjoint) subsets of equal sizes, is a (proper) vertex coloring in which every color appears exactly once in every part. A graph is strongly ''k''-colorable if ...

Fractional chromatic number Fractional coloring is a topic in a young branch of graph theory known as fractional graph theory. It is a generalization of ordinary graph coloring. In a traditional graph coloring, each vertex in a graph is assigned some color, and adjacent ver ...

* Vertex chromatic number

Other uses

Von Luschan's chromatic scale Von Luschan's chromatic scale (VLS) is a method of classifying skin color. It is also called the von Luschan scale or von Luschan's scale. It is named after its inventor, Felix von Luschan. The equipment consists of 36 opaque glass tiles which ...

, a method for classifying skin color * Chromatic dragon in Dungeons & Dragons *

chromatic (programmer) Chromatic is a writer and free software programmer best known for his work in the Perl programming language. He lives in Hillsboro, Oregon, United States. He wrote ''Extreme Programming Pocket Guide'', co-wrote ''Perl Testing: A Developer's ...

, a Perl programmer and writer *

Chromatics Inc. Chromatics Inc. was a color graphics display manufacturer based in Tucker, Georgia. Their systems predated the personal computer era of inexpensive graphics displays, and were typically used as Peripheral, peripheral devices, connected to a Mainfra ...

, a manufacturer of color graphics display systems *chromatic, of biological material, the ability to take up

staining Staining is a technique used to enhance contrast in samples, generally at the microscopic level. Stains and dyes are frequently used in histology (microscopic study of biological tissues), in cytology (microscopic study of cells), and in the ...

In music

In optics, vision, and color

In mathematics

Other uses

See also

In music

In Ancient Greek and Byzantine music

In optics, vision and color