Black and White

Part 3 Colour
Project: Black and White
Exercise 1: Colours into tones in black-and-white
Aim: Show how colour filters affect tones of different colours in black and white images.

Original

No Filter

Yellow filter

This appears to be the most moderate of the 4 filters I used. The yellow pepper is considerably lighter than the other two whereas the blue background is the darkest of the four colours. The Green pepper is almost unaffected and the the Red is a little lighter than with no filter

Green filter

This filter is similar overall to the Yellow, but it has the opposite effect on the Red pepper as it is darkened considerably. The Green and Yellow pepper's (and the Blue background) are almost the same shade and seem to all remain a neutral Grey tone.

Blue filter

The Blue filter has significantly altered all four colours and is very different from the other filter's I used. The Blue background is much lighter than the previous filters and all 3 pepper's have been darkened to almost the same shade. The lightest colour (Yellow) has been turned to the darkest shade of Grey whereas one of the darkest colours (Blue) has been made the lightest.

Red filter

This filter (followed by Blue) has the most dramatic effect out of all the ones I used. The Red and Yellow pepper's have been lightened considerably and the Green pepper is the only colour to have remained as a mid-tone  The Blue and Red filters seem to be complete opposites in the effects the have on different colours as the Blue filter's darkest colours are the Red's lightest and Red's darkest are Blue's lightest.

This exercise has been very useful to see how the different colours react to each other and it's interesting to see how their effects can be linked to their places on colour wheel. With each coloured filter, it's own colour was always lightened and in most cases, so was the colours next to them (in the wheel). For example: The Green filter lightened the Green pepper and also the Yellow one; and the Red filter lightened the Yellow pepper as well.
In general, I found that the filter will lighten it's own colour while darkening the colours opposite or 1/3  across from it on the colour wheel.

Primary and Secondary Colours

Part 3 Colour
Project: What makes a colour
Exercise 1- Primary and Secondary colours
Aim: Show how colour can be affected by brightness.

It was defiantly a challenge to get all the pictures for this exercise using only natural subjects, and I had to use a man made object for the Blue pictures (the only natural Blues I found were either too light or dark than the pure shade I was looking for).  The effects different exposures had on the different colours was very interesting. Some did not seem to be affected much at all, such as Blue and Green, whereas Red, Violet and Orange appeared to be the most sensitive.

I found that the different colours seemed to "lead" to the colour next to them on the colour wheel as they got darker (or lighter). For example, the darker the Yellow appeared in the picture, the closer it got to the lighter Orange in the next set of pictures. This is also most evident in Violet and Blue but not so much with the other colours.

This exercise has helped me pick out and focus on individual colours in a picture, and to focus on the colour rather than the subject, which was an interesting change from what I'm used to.

Colour Relationships

Part 3 Colour
Project: Colour Relationships
Exercise 1- Colour Relationships
Aim: To find specific combinations of primary and secondary colours in their ratio values

According to colour theory, the combinations for complementary colours work best when arranged in certain ratio's. This helps to create balance between colours of a different brightness.

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

(Some of the sources I used to help better understand basic colour theory:
http://www.framedreality.com/color-in-photography-color-theory
http://www.colormatters.com/color-and-design/basic-color-theory
http://www.andyharbin.co.uk/ArtColTheory(v2).html )

Red/Green

Orange/Blue (adding picture soon)

Yellow/Violet

This exercise made me focus on finding both pure colours and a specific amount of each colour in the composition  which could be quite challenging at times but it did help me understand why different ratio's are needed to create harmonious colour combinations. Red/Green are both equally bright colours that seemed balanced with equal amounts in the picture. Both Orange and Yellow are a lot brighter than their complementary colours so their effect on in the picture is a lot better when there is only a small amount of the bright colour compared to the darker and more muted colours.

Control the strength of a colour

Part 3 Colour
Project: What makes a colour
Exercise 1
Aim: Show how changing exposure affects colour.
       
This project focuses on colour, and how we can control it with manual camera's. For this exercise, the subject I have chosen is part of the bright red post box in my village. The camera's automatic setting's were 1/200, f7.1 and ISO100. I took 3 pictures each a stop brighter than the average (f8, f9, f10) and 3 pictures a stop lower (f6.3, f5.6, f5). The shutter speed and ISO remained the same throughout the exercise.

1.

1/200  f10

2.

1/200  f9 

3.

1/200  f8 (closest to subject in real life)

4.

1/200  f7.1  (metered exposure)

5.

1/200  f6.3

6.

1/200  f5.6

7.

1/200  f5

The most prominent change between the photo's is the brightness. Image 1 is slightly under exposed, making the colour darker and deeper. The red is noticeably more vivid than the other pictures. As the pictures become more over-exposed they have started to lose detail and contrast. The brightness value has gone up and they are slightly less saturated than the darker ones. The hue has changed slightly to a more pinkish colour than red and would have moved to the orange part of the spectrum had I continued to take higher metered pictures.

In Photoshop  I took an example of the main colour from the same place in both the first and last pictures. Below, you can clearly see the difference in brightness, saturation and hue. #1 is taken from the first photo (f10) and #2 is from the last (f5):

1.  H= 2
     S= 83%
     B= 78%

2.  H= 6
     S= 67%
     B=  99%

This has been a very interesting exercise that has helped me understand the relationships and differences between HSB and how they can be affected. I found this article very helpful as is explains clearly and in detail how colour works in photography: http://www.framedreality.com/color-in-photography-color-theory