Anthanasius rightly points out these colors work with my BBGlossy shader for a decent metal and you could certainly use that and 99% of folk would never notice it wasn't perfect.

However, the BBGlossy assumes a constant color from all angles, whereas that's not true of real life. Kawecki rightly brings up the notion of a complex IOR and that is certainly a factor. However, I built a shader with a 3-channel IOR and it doesn't look right. Maybe I did it wrong.

After building the 3-channel IOR and seeing it produce pink at the edges of gold, I decided that maybe in this case the physics department has an over-simplified answer and I'd be better off actually measuring the colors and then apply theory, instead of the other way around.

It was after I did that, I found the realism of the gold increased. So did my stainless steel. I did not have a good sample of copper, and may have to revisit that one. For gold, steel, and brass, I have flat shiny pieces. For copper all I have are curved and/or dull pieces, so accurate measurements are very difficult.

My plan is to sell this shader, not give it away. My wife is really mad at me for never selling anything, always giving it away.

Note that this thread is not about my shader - it's not a commercial. I honestly wanted to share the news of what the ding-dang color of gold actually is! I could not find it anywhere.

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Renderosity forum reply notifications are wonky. If I read a follow-up in a thread, but I don't myself reply, then notifications no longer happen AT ALL on that thread. So if I seem to be ignoring a question, that's why. (Updated September 23, 2019)