Part 3 - Ex 4 - Colours into Tones in Black & White

This exercise was all about showing that understanding colour in black and white photography gives a powerful tonal control, allowing emphasis of certain objects while suppressing others.

Because I was using digital images I had only to take one shot of an arrange still life with 4 objects coloured red, blue, yellow and green with a mid grey card or as I chose to do, have a mid grey background. I then converted the colour image in lightroom to black & white, firstly neutral with all B&W Mix colour channels at zero to represent no filters, then with the B&W red channel at +100 to represent a red filter, then similarly adjusting each channel to represent blue, yellow and green filters then note the tonal changes that occurred in the image.

Original Colour Image

As can be seen, I used a grey top as a background, a banana, pepper, lettuce and pieces of lego to represent the relative colours and light the scene with window light and a reflector to fill in some shadows.

No Filter

With no filter all the colours have their own tonal value with only yellow at a similar brightness to the mid tone grey and the others all darker.

Red Filter

With the red filter it has a dramatic effect on the red pepper, brightening it to a similar tone as the the grey background and with the distinctive shape of the banana and knowing they are all generally yellow, the now similarly toned pepper makes the mind presume it is either an orange or yellow pepper where as in the image with no filter it was possible to imagine a red or green pepper from its tone.

Blue Filter

Here with a blue filter we find it is the blue lego pieces that now change in tone, appearing brighter than the mid grey background. Suggesting again they could have been original a bright colour like yellow or orange.

Green Filter

This time it is the lettuce that has been brightened with the application of the green filter. Now a similar tone to the grey background which in turn throws a question mark over the viewers perception of its original colour.

Yellow Filter

The yellow filter has dramatic effect on the banana now a very bright object almost burnt out. It now stands out from all the other objects which remain either mid toned or dark. 

Now understanding that a filter will allow that particular colours' light through and brighten it this has been a very worthwhile exercise, where I found out some of the effects that can be applied to black & white images by altering the colour channels to create different tones for individual objects. It was noted that the mid grey background remained exactly the same throughout the set of images.

Part 3 - Colour - Exercise 3 - Colour Relationships

This exercise was in two parts. The first being to produce one photograph of each complimentary pair of colours (opposites in the colour wheel) to the following ratios:

Red - Green 1:1
Orange - Blue 1:2
Yellow - Violet 1:3

These ratios were first suggested by German poet/playwright J.W. Von Goethe and given to help help harmonise the complimentary colours by balancing the relative brightness of each Hue.

Red/Green 1:1

This image has the 1:1 ratio for red and green and I tried to introduce a mirror image setup, just the kids on the chairs had other ideas. Red and green should never be seen is a well known saying but in an image with these ratios in particular it can be seen the do fall into a complimentary category bringing harmony to one another.

Orange/Blue 1:2

Blue and orange I feel are quite common especially in shop fronts and sales, probably with the brightness of the orange becoming more striking when placed next to the pure blue with this ratio of 1:2.

Yellow/Violet 1:3

I used a close up of an old football which conveniently had yellow and violet as decoration. With a tight crop I tried to get the ratio of 1:3 giving the bright yellow some harmony in the dark violet appearing in a generally satisfying way.


The second part of the exercise was to show 3 photos that show two or more combinations of colours that appeal to me, and the idea being to prove that there is no single correctness to complimentary colours.

Image 1

Here in image 1 I found these colourful rows of nail polish in a local stall. I chose it because I wanted to study the effect of putting so many colours together in some kind of order. With yellow being the only one omitted, all the hue's of the colour wheel are are represented, mostly all on the second row. This row demands the main attention with a dynamic feeling to it, leaving the rest of the rows to fall in behind much more peacefully. I felt the 4 rows could possibly represent the 1:3 ratio that yellow and violet needs to create harmony, with the colourful 2nd row representing the omitted bright yellow and the other 3 weaker rows representing the darker violet.

Image 2

Image 2 is again many combinations of colour. The rows of trainers have many colours and some individual shoes also have their own mini combination of intensely saturated Hues. This certainly create an imbalance in the image. With so much going on, from the many colours to the different direction of the pairs then to the uneven pairing of two right shoes and no left shoe in any of the display, there is a very hectic and energetic feel creating uneasiness and only manages to throw the eye all over the image, never resting anywhere. This could arguably be useful in the promotion of sports footwear suggest activeness and motion.

Image 3

Image 3 is in complete contrast to image 2, with a much more balanced scene. For a start the four main Hues are softer with weaker saturation and all slightly bright. Blue and orange being the only pairing that can be described as complimentary I thought it would be interesting to study this combination of four colour is this mainly neutral setting. The definite lines of the roof structure do bring an order to the image, with the darker tones of the shadows at the bottom of the shot and brighter areas of the defused light from the skylights at the top the is a controlled balance. I feel the harmonious combination of colours just help to complete the balance of the whole image and just get enough edginess from the non complimentary pairs to make bring it alive enough to make it interesting.

Again another interesting exercise where I had to explore more colours around my environment and forced to think about their relationship to one another in their surroundings. Something I have never done before and must admit I am enjoying learning more from each exercise. It seems there is good  reason to understand the complimentary pairings along with the harmonious ratios but there is also nothing set in stone and like many elements of photography, rules are not definite. Each image and photograph has its own story to tell and knowing how to use these rules to tell it is what learning is all about.

Part 3 - Colour - Exercise 2 - Primary & Secondary Colours

Above is a graphic of a colour wheel taken from the internet. The colour wheel shows the 3 primary colours, Red, Blue and Yellow as well as the 3 secondary colours Green, Orange and Purple.

In this exercise I have taken 6 photographs of a scene that individually feature or are dominated by one single colour from the colour wheel.

Each image is taken at the cameras correctly exposed setting then another 2 shots were taken, one stopped up the other stopped down. Where this couldn't be down at the point of capture, I recreated the under and over exposure in lightroom.

Primary Colours

 Red

Stopped up

Correct Exposure

Stopped Down

Here I took a photograph of a row of red training shoes in a shop, lit with spot lights from above. I only took one shot and stopped up/down in lightroom. The correct exposure made with the cameras meter shows a deep red fabric with intense saturation and slightly dark in brightness but when stopped up the red becomes pure and bright. Under exposing the image created a much deeper and overly saturated red almost beginning to darken to black in the shadow areas. For me the stopped up image best matches the red in the colour wheel.

Blue

Stopped Down

Correctly Exposed

Stopped Up

I found this stain glass window in the Museum of Modern Art in Glasgow. I liked how the light coming in threw a nice blue light around the room. I took 3 separate photos, the correctly expose at 1/40s f8 and stopped down to f11 then stopped up to f5.6. I'm going to go with the lighter stopped up image as the one more like the colour wheel blue with both the darker images making the blue in the bottom windows too dark and going towards black in the stopped down image.

Yellow

Stopped Down

Correctly Exposed

Stopped Up

I used bananas for yellow and used Lightroom to under and over expose. With daylight coming in from the right, there is a slight highlight across the top of the bananas which gets washed out when the exposure is stopped up. But I feel it is this image that matches the yellows best to the colour wheel delivering a good, bright and pure yellow.

Secondary Colours

Orange

Stopped Up 

Correctly Exposed

Stopped Down

This mural found in Glasgow's city centre has a predominant orange Hue with the figures in a neutral grey. The saturation is weak in the under exposed image and slightly dark, the correctly exposed is dull with average brightness and the overexposed giving generally the most intense and bright orange which I feel is similar to the colour wheel, although as with all the images there is a differing light to dark exposure running left to right, this was due to the light coming in from the main road lighting this arched close where mural was found. So the left hand side of the overexposed image does have an area of pure and very bright orange, but I feel the majority of the image has an orange similar to the colour wheel.

Green

Stopped Down

Correctly Exposed

Stopped Up

For green I found a kids garden spade. Here I feel the overexposed is rather unsaturated and fairly bright, the correct exposure saturated and average brightness and feel the underexposed to be the closest to the colour wheel green with intense saturation and slightly dark. 

Purple/Violet

Stopped Up

Correctly Exposed

Stopped Down

This sculpture was used to capture purple, three shots were taken at f5.6 f8 and f11 all 1/30s. For me the correctly exposed image is the most like the colour wheel purple with a saturated and dark colour surface. I have to presume though, that with my metering system on average for the whole image that with the white background the camera has done what it always does with white and underexposing it as it tries to find the medium grey. So I am presuming that the correctly exposed labelled image is probably 1 stop underexposed, meaning the closest to the colour wheel is technically the stopped down labelled 'correctly exposed' here.

In conclusion to this exercise I admit it has alerted my attention to colours that are all around me but have been largely ignored on my part. An enjoyable exercise that opened my eyes to the many kinds of colours that build up our world both indoors and out.

Assignment 2 - Elements of Design, My Tutors Comments

Feedback on assignment

Your work shows good imagination and creativity in picking up on the

influence of Andrea Michele Landini’s 'Magic Trip'. It would have been worth

while quoting the book using the harvard reference system - a guide to this

can be found on the OCA’s website. Other than this I think that this is a great

approach to the brief presenting images that are a novel and refreshing theme

to illustrate the brief.

There’s a balance to be struck between meeting the brief to illustrate the topic

and creating an interesting image that falls into the theme. Quite where and

how you strike the balance is up to you; however, some of your images have

the balance favouring the theme and placing illustrating the brief second.

In some instances, I feel that your foreknowledge of the scene colours your

description and interpretation of the image. Others, who don’t have this

knowledge, perhaps don’t see or recognise the elements in the image that

you see. For example, your image of two points. Of itself this wouldn’t matter

but I suggest that your foreknowledge distracts you from other possibilities for

the image.

In this case your distinct and irregular shape image - I find recognising the

road sign hard if not impossible. This doesn’t matter; but I suggest that the

images as you have it contains several shapes and as such may be

distracting. I suggest a tighter crop to simplify the image and concentrate

attention more on the fulfillment on the brief.

I particularly like your introduction of elements of the car to the image that lifts

the image out of the ordinary interpretation of the brief. Your creativity is ably

demonstrated. An example of this is your illustration of diagonal - window

washer.

A couple of suggestions on this image: the placement of the screen wash

nozzle - you have it very close to the top of the frame; would it be better to

place this on the top left third intersection? Another suggestion to strengthen

the notion of lifting the image out of the ordinary might be to sprinkle water

droplets on to the bonnet of the car. Just thoughts to add to an already good

image.

There are one or two images that might be improved technically. A couple of

them seem to have suspect focus.

Examples of this are where you have dust or other ‘specs’ on the car body.

See the image ‘flying high’ where the specs are blurred and compare this to

the narrow lines image where the specs are sharp. Y0our ‘U-turn’ image also

seems to be unsharp. The actual handle rather than the reflections should I

feel be sharp.

Suggestions/thoughts on the images are as follows:

Single point - good image that works well. The fence posts in the top right of

frame are perhaps a little distracting in terms of moving attention away from

the post box. Suggestion: move the camera view to put the post box top right

of frame.

Two Points - good image that fits the theme but not convinced about ‘two

points’ there is a strong diagonal which makes for a good composition but

there are several ‘points’ along it.

Several Points - Yes a good image but the several points are fairly uniform

and the dark area on the left of frame is perhaps distracting - how about

rotating the image and cropping it to lessen its impact:

Your second image (signs of the tree) I feel is the better of the two. I

particularly like the rippling of the paint work on the right of frame as this keys

the viewer into the two scenes in the image - the reflection and the actuality of

the car body work.

Horizontal and Vertical Lines - As you say a simple shot that mets the brief

and the theme but it is perhaps a little ordinary. I wonder if an increase

contrast might help - see what you think:

Diagonal - A good shot again - I’ve already commented about the positioning

of the nozzle.

Curves - Yes a great image - I particularly like the contrast between the

straight blurred lines in the top half of the frame and the curve of the handle in

the bottom half. That you only include part of the handle also works well

leaving the viewer to extrapolate this ‘missing’ aspect.

Distinct Shape - I’ve already commented on this one. I like the ‘sharp’ dust

specs that again give the viewer the two aspects: the actual car panel and the

abstract shape.

Triangle - Both good shots. I prefer the first one: it’s sharp and shows the

triangles well while keeping within the theme of the set of images. THe

second image I feel while has the triangle of the two ‘blobs’ of the signs and

the edge of the handle, it suffers from the distraction of the cars at the bottom

of the frame. Also I feel it would benefit from having the specs on the right of

the frame sharp as this would be in keeping with ‘Distinct shape’.

Rhythm - Yes a good image but this is one image that I feel you have the

balance between theme and brief wrong. Yes the eye can be thought to

bobble across the tops of the trees moving from left to right, but I think that

there are too many other distraction in the image that are concerned with the

theme. There are better images (in terms of meeting the brief) amoung your

images on your blog exercise for rhythm; but I realise that they don’t fall in

with the theme.

Like the notion of “a pinch of salt” as an illustration of the topic. The focus

tends to be on the van but as this is recognisably little it also fits the bill.

Would try for a squarer crop and not use rounded corners.

Pattern - Another good image that shows your good observation and

creativity. It makes a good interesting and well composed image. But consider

the brief - pattern... this supposes a repeating (probably single) pattern that

extends beyond the edges of the frame. In your image the main pattern is the

squares of the carport but thees are then dominated by the strong diagonal

midway up the frame and then further dissipated towards the top of the frame

by the other shapes/objects and colours.

I’m not saying your image is wrong or bad just alerting you to where your

pursuit of the theme is overwhelming the brief.