I have a long list (1000+) of hex colors broken up in general color categories (Red, Orange, Blue, etc). When I show the list of colors in each category I need to show them in order of shade. i.e. light red first and dark red last.
What would the algorithm be to do this? (googling has failed me)
Convert the colors from RGB to a HSV or HSL scale and then sort them by Value or Lightness. Lightness might work better as it would capture the "faded" colors better, such as pink->red->dark red.