Why does backgroundColor() not match identify -verbose?

[treaves]

I have several black & white images. If I run identify -verbose, Background Color: is correct; white when it is white, and black when it is black. However, when I use backgroundColor().to_std_string() always returns #FFFFFFFFFFFF. Moreover, I can do image.negate() and then the backgroundColor().to_std_string() still shows #FFFFFFFFFFFF (even though if I save the image, identify will show the correct color).

Am I not understanding something?

[anthony]

To items First #FFFFFFFFFFFF is white! Just a different representation of white

Second negate negates the image data. It does not touch meta-data such as background color