The Prizma Color system was a color motion picture process, invented in 1913 by William Van Doren Kelley and Charles Raleigh. Initially, it was a two-color additive color system, similar to its predecessor, Kinemacolor. Kelley eventually transformed Prizma into a bi-pack color system that itself became the predecessor for future color processes such as Multicolor and Cinecolor.

Prizma gave a demonstration of color motion pictures in 1917 that used an additive four-color process, using a disk of four filters acting on a single strip of panchromatic film in the camera. The colors were red, yellow, green, and blue, with overlapping wavelengths to prevent pulsating effects on the screen with vivid colors. The film was photographed at 26 to 32 frames per second, and projected at 32 frame/s. The disk used in projection consisted mainly of two colors, red-orange and blue-green, adapted to the four-color process by the superimposition of two small magenta filters over one of the red sectors and two similar blue filters over one of the blue-green sectors. Motion Picture News reported,

The first commercial system of Prizma was similar to Kinemacolor in that the camera took alternating frames of red-orange and blue-green colors through color filters placed within the camera's shutter. Projection involved running a colored disc again in synchronization with the black and white color record film, and through persistence of vision, the two frames combined on the screen to form a color image.

The first film shown in Prizma color was the feature Our Navy at the 44th Street Theatre in New York City on 23 December 1917. General reception to the system was positive, but the rotating filter wheel technique proved impractical. To counteract the issue of having a special projector with a filter wheel, Kelley began tinting alternate frames of his film red and green. However, fringeing, flicker, and light loss were major issues which plagued not only Prizma, but also all of the other additive systems of the Kinemacolor nature.

In counteracting this, Kelley had filed a patent in February 1917 which proved to be the foundation of Prizma's second color system.

On 28 December 1918, Kelley announced that Prizma would release a color film (usually a short) every week, a film which would be projectable on any standard projector. Kelley's idea was two years in the making, but was a valid one which became the springboard for all future color systems to follow – two films were filmed simultaneously with a camera of his own design. One strip was sensitive to red-orange, the other to blue-green (cyan). Both negatives were processed and printed on duplitized film, and then each emulsion was toned its complementary color, red or blue. The final result was a color image that was subtractive in nature – no flicker and a bright projection. But as a result of the way the camera was designed, a constant fringe was apparent, as the strips were being recorded side-by-side.

In January 1919, this new process was premiered at the Rivoli Theatre in New York City with the short Everywhere With Prizma. Kelley, based in Jersey City, New Jersey, was a friend of the Rivoli's manager and music director Hugo Riesenfeld and so did business with Samuel Roxy Rothafel's Roxy Theaters chain, which the Rivoli was part of.

In February 1921, another Prizma film, Bali, the Unknown was premiered at Roxy's Capitol Theatre in New York. The four-reel feature garnered lukewarm reviews, but enough positive audience response that more films were produced in the system.