Blue outfits... or grey??

Hmmm... These outfits were based on the black outfits from the movies, I thought... but they're blue-grey!

Havok wears an all-black outfit... Don't he?

Waitaminit... It's a white outfit!!...

Just has a lotta shadow, is all.

The Garcia-Lopez Wonder Man is wearing black, just like his hair.

When this topic comes up, I usually point to Superman and Wonder Woman's hair as an example.  Does anybody think they "actually" have blue hair?  I doubt it, but for soem reason (the coding JB mentioned above) they see these costumes as blue.

Matt, unfortunately I see a blue outfit in that Wonder Man pic.  I know that it's black but I "see" it as blue.  Maybe it's a super-hero thing.  Red and blue just seem to go together.  Also, in my defense(can't speak for everyone) I think some artwork is done better than others in portraying "black" properly.

As far as "blue" hair goes, can't hair in reality appear blue.  I know I've seen guys with a shaved beard that appears blue(ish).  Old ladys sometimes have blue hair.  The blood that nurtures the hair is actually blue isn't it(or is that an old wive's tale?  Blood is blue until it hits oxygen, right?)

People do think they have blue hair. There was even an old Wonder Woman story that explained why Wonder Woman had blue hair. (Explicitly saying that she did!)

That is crazy!

Venous (deoxygenated) blood is blue/blueish,/bluer.

Arteriole blood is red, bright red.  It doesn't have to "hit" oxygen.  It has to be oxygenated (on its way to the cells vs. on its way back to the lungs).

So this is…?

Awesome!  Comics in their truest form, the way children imagine them in their minds.

Andy, is Nova's costume blue or black?  As a kid, I always saw it as blue.

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It's blue.  In the original 25 issue run back in the '70's I think it was black.  He was referred to as "in black" in the first issue.  By the time he reappeared in the New Warriors(after he got rid of the red outfit and moniker "Kid Nova") he was wearing blue and the recent Annihilation related books all have him clearly in blue(albeit with an updated variation of the original costume).

Matt, the Wonder Man pic you posted has the outfit as blue, but I prefer JB's interpretation from AWC since I really believe WM's costume of that era to be black and red.  The Black Panther pic JB posted is a great example of a dark grey-blue costume with black shadows on the bits facing away from the light source.  It's tough to determine from 60's-70's era comics due to the limitations of coloring, but modern books don't have this problem with the millions of colors possible.  If anyone gets a chance, please check out the most recent issue of Fantastic Four by McDuffie and Pelletier: within the issue can be found Reed and Sue in their original FF costumes, Ben and Johnny in their JB-designed uniforms, and Black Panther and Storm.  It's a great comparison of the older FF uniforms as lighter blue (with black trim), the newer FF uniforms as darker blue (with white trim), and Panther's and Storm's costumes as dark grey.

Here's the thing: look at your own shirt you're wearing.  Whatever color it is, the portions facing towards natural light will be a lighter shade of that color, and those away from the light will be a darker shade of that color.  Since comics have to be printed as solid blacks, shadows will always be solid black, when in reality shadows (or portions of objects away from direct light ) are in darker shades of their color.  If all light is absent, then no color is reflected back to your eye and it appears black.  The only way a black outfit will appear blue (assuming it is a shiny reflective material, and not a matte material that absorbs all light) is when the light source is blue-colored, such as within a cockpit or special room.  Post-original team Cyclops' outfit has some amount of blue in every single image of him (minus the small handful of times he's in little to no light), and when in lots of light, completely blue, so his outfit is considered blue.  Natural light illuminating a black shiny costume would highlight the outfit as dark grey all the way through white depending on the intensity of the lighting.  It would not appear blue.  So the coloring of black hair highlights as blue is wrong (and not a good justification for coloring black outfit highlights) unless the light source is blue.  Black hair highlights would be anywhere from grey to white assuming the light is natural.  I'm not trying to disrespect any classic/traditional or modern colorist (who likely continue the practice because that's how it's always been done in comics), but the only way hair has blue coloring in real life is if the hair color is actually blue or the lighting is blue.  If you have to explain to the average person why comics hair is highlighted blue, it's not because they "don't get it", it's because that effect doesn't happen in real life!