We propose to use optical multichannel correlation in various chromatic systems to obtain a setup for recognition of polychromatic three-dimensional (3-D) objects based on Fourier-transform profilometry. Because red-green-blue color components are not able to split the luminance information of objects in a defined component, when the 3-D objects are brighter than the reference objects the correlation result gives false alarms. We demonstrate that it is possible to use different color spaces that can split luminance from chromatic information to yield adequate recognition of polychromatic 3-D objects. We show experimental results that prove the utility of the proposed method.