Most paint programs allow you to do two things that are sadly missing from the paper world:

1) Select the color of your brush from a color palette 2) Select the color of your brush from an existing color

The AnyColor pen remedies this. The pen contains Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, and Black ink cartridges, and adjusts the flow rate to create the desired color. (These are the same subtractive colors used in inkjet printers)

The color can be specified by adjusting three (R,G,B) sliders and displayed on a miniature color LCD screen built into the back of the pen. (Other input methods are possible such as a touch-screen color LCD screen built into the side with a palette, etc.)

Alternately, the user can press a button on the side of the pen and tap on any real world object. Photocells in near the tip of the pen register the RGB value of the of the object, and adjust the flow rate accordingly (the back of the pen also turns the appropriate color).

AnyColor pen cartridges will be available at your local cartridge store or Wal-Mart :)
-- cowtamer, Nov 20 2006

Could this work? http://en.wikipedia...ki/CMYK_color_model
CMYK to RGB conversions and what not [Chefboyrbored, Nov 20 2006]

For [Jscotty]: Bic 4-Color Pen http://www.shoplet....Four-Color_Pen.html
Available individually and in quantity. [jurist, Nov 21 2006]

red dot design award - Color Picker http://www.red-dot....06/ed/R026color.htm
only a design concept. [xaviergisz, Sep 28 2009]

Not a bad idea but obtaining perfect color would be near impossible. LINK
-- Chefboyrbored, Nov 20 2006


Perfection, Schmerfection. I don't understand why this doesn't exist yet!
-- jutta, Nov 21 2006


Neat idea - I'd like one that continuously changed colors.
-- DrCurry, Nov 21 2006


Brilliant! This reminds me of that multi-colored pen sold by Bic that has 4 colors with the levers on the back of it so you could choose red, black, green, or blue. I don't know if this pen is still being sold but I thought it was cool when I first saw it in the 80's. I mean this is a different concept but as I was reading all I could think about was that pen that my teacher had.
-- Jscotty, Nov 21 2006


what a headache to develop. wow.
-- shinobi, Nov 21 2006


I like this idea, I was thinking of something like this to do touchups on a slightly damaged wall. Onboard paint matching.
-- djmips, Mar 06 2007


Excellent! [+]
-- MaxwellBuchanan, Mar 08 2007


Very cool - and this ought to be possible with inkjet technology. The pen should also have a 'random' setting and a setting which bases the pen colour on a boolean transformation of the colour of whatever you're drawing on - so you should be able to write on top of something else with an XOR pen, for example.
-- hippo, Sep 28 2009


Thanks for the link xaviergisz. I feel good having posted this 2 years before the winner of the design award :) [Usually I find that these things have been done way BEFORE I came up with the idea...]
-- cowtamer, Jan 06 2010


What [MaxwellBuchanan] said.

But there's one snag - when you change colours, what happens to all the previous-coloured ink which is in the path between the mixing point and the paper?
-- MaxwellBuchanan, Jan 07 2010



random, halfbakery