The Basic About Color Photography

While Black and White Photography has long been the photo class standard, there comes a time when every photographer wants to experiment with representing the world in the exact way that we see it in color. In order to learn color photography it requires a firm understanding of the basic elements of photography which can be broken down into the following easy to understand elements.

Contrast

In Black and White Photography, contrast refers to the difference between the lightest and darkest elements of a photograph. Summed up, you can think of it as how white is white? With Black and White Photography, there are really only three tones: low contrast, medium and high contrast but with color photography it gets a little more complicated. Color photographs have color contrast, as opposed to the tonal contrast of black and white.

Color contrast is determined by the way each of the colors interacts with the colors surrounding it. While the contrast can still be adjusted to push bright to dark ratio, the colors in a photograph appear different depending on whats around them. For instance, think of a baseball sitting in bright green grass that image has high color contrast because the bright white of the baseball will stand out against the cool green of the grass.

The Temperature of Your Colors

Whenever you take photographs in color you will have to keep an eye on their color temperature. One thing that will affect the color temperature of your picture is the different types of lights that you use. While there are a lot of technical measurements for color temperature and the way it interacts with actual temperature, we can think of it in terms of tint.

Tint and color temperature are actually referred to as “white balance” in photography. How this works is that film and sensors are made with a specific kind of light in mind and anytime a picture is taken in a different lighting situation it impacts whether or not the white looks truly white. For example, if you take a picture underneath a fluorescent light is always has a green tint to it because that’s the color temperature of those lights

Using Temperature

When shooting in color, it is important to understand which color temperature or tint is best for the image youre trying to create. Warm, reddish tints, like those at sunset, are flattering to most skin tones while bluish tints are better for neutral product pictures.

You can adjust your white balance several different ways- you can do it with your Camera, by using filters, editing the image in the darkroom or by using photo editing software. One way to make sure you get a great shot is by shooting the picture several times using different white balance settings so you can later choose the best one.

Color theory is a complex art that professional photographers work their entire lives to master. Designers often take several courses on color as part of their education, and there is no shortage of competing opinions on how color can be used best to achieve certain goals.

If you’re just starting off learning to use color, then your first goal is to accurately capture the image the way you see it. Once you’re able to start doing this with color images, you can start using different colors to add emotional impact to your photographic story. As always, you should stick to the rule of doing whatever works best for your photographs and what gives you results you enjoy.