Look-alikes · Japan · San Marino
Japan vs San Marino
Two copies of one picture are 0% apart and the widest pair in the world is 100%.
Japan and San Marino are 35% apart. They are closer than 98% of the flag pairs in the world.
Where the difference is
Each colour on Japan, matched with the nearest colour on San Marino, and how far apart the two are, the number is the worst single tile, out of 255.
- #ffffff#ffffff0
- #bc002d#5eb6e4183
The colour that separates them is red against blue: #bc002d against #5eb6e4, 183 apart.
How they are put together
Nothing about how they are built was measured the same on both.
Only Japan: a single-coloured ground, a disc. Only San Marino: horizontal bands.
What each one carries
Japan carries a sun. San Marino carries a cross, a coat of arms, a shield, a leaf, a wreath, and a crown.
How the number was arrived at
Both flags are drawn at 64×48 and cut into squares 8 across. Each square is averaged to one colour, and the score is the worst single square, so two flags that agree everywhere except one corner are as far apart as that corner, which is the right answer to a question about whether anybody could tell them apart. 0 is the same picture; the number is the worst single tile, out of 255.
On that scale Japan and San Marino score 89.8 out of 255, which is the 35% above.
It cannot see everything. Both flags are stretched to the same box, so Indonesia and Monaco, which differ in nothing else, are measured as their reds rather than as identical. The look-alikes page sets out the rest.
Also close
The flags the pipeline measured nearest to these two.