Shirley cards

Shirley cards are special pictures that were used a long time ago to help people test and adjust the color of their cameras and TV screens.

A long time ago, cameras and TV screens used to have a hard time showing colors correctly. Sometimes they would show things too blue, or too orange, or too green! This made it hard for people to know if their pictures and TV shows looked the same in real life as they did on the screen.

That's where Shirley cards come in! Shirley cards are special pictures of a lady named Shirley, who wears bright, colorful clothes and stands in front of a plain background. The colors on Shirley's clothes are carefully chosen to be just the right shade of red, green, and blue.

When people wanted to test their camera or adjust their TV screen, they would use a Shirley card as a guide. They would try to adjust the colors on the screen so that Shirley's clothes looked just as bright and colorful as they did in real life.

Nowadays, cameras and TV screens are a lot better at showing colors correctly, so we don't need Shirley cards as much anymore. But they were really important back in the olden days!