Excercise - Colour relationships

First part - combination of primary and secondary colour.

from Micheal Freeman:
If we threat harmony in the sense of pleasing, acceptable relationship, there are two well-established classes,
one is complementary harmony - hues across the colour circle
the other is harmony of similarity (hues from the same sector of the colour circle

Different hues are perceived as having different light values. The German poet and playwright J.W. von Goethe was the first to assign values to hues -
Yellow = 9
Orange = 8
Red = Green = 6
Blue = 4
Violet = 3

According to the colour theory, colours harmonize most completely with each other when their areas are in inverse proportion to their relative brightness.

a) Red : Green = 1 : 1 (equally bright)
I thought this combination was going to be fairly easy since there is green every where, trees, grass, bushes but to find red and green was not so easy. I took a few photos of some red fruits with green leaves but the lighting was not good so it didn't turn out that well.
The image below, I placed a fallen leave on a bush so it produce a nice contrast. I didn't have diffuser or reflector so I had to be careful about the reflection on the leave itself. I had to take it from a certain angle that it didn't reflect so much light off that leave.


b) Orange : Blue = 1 : 2 (orange is as twice as bright as blue)
At the time I look for "orange and blue" combination, the trees started changing colour so I took a lot of pictures of tree top that turned rusty orange contrasting bright blue sky but when my husband and I walking pass this bright blue door, I think i prefered this combination more so i asked him to stand in front of the door for me to take the picture. I adjusted the hue/saturation/lighting and get rid of some blemish on the door so I could have a nice contrast colour image below.


c) Yellow : Violet = 1 : 3 (yellow and violet are extremes of the brightness scale)
I rarely found the combination here anywhere. I did find a flower with this colour but I was on a train so I couldn't take the picture of it.
This image was taken in a Department store. I found a rack of violet jumpers and yellow jumpers so I put one yellow in between violet just to create contrast.


Second part - combinations of two colours or more.
objective is to demonstrate that there is no single "correctness" to complementary colours.

Not long after finishing first part of this exercise (end of November 2010) the weather in England became gloomy and snowy. Everywhere I looked was full of snow with white predominant. I couldn't proceed with this excercise so I had to wait until I could see more colour.

Now, March 2011, after months of waiting and making excuses, I notice that spring is here at last and I can't put this course off any longer. I determine to finish what I started.

d)combination 1 - green yellow with rusty orange
The yellow colour flower seem dominant in this picture even though the area of yellow is not great.



e) combination 2 blue dominant with yellow complement
I took this image below when my husband and I went on cruise in December. The ocean was so dark blue and the sky was light blue contasting with yellow base windmill. The small ship sailing pass, I just had to take the shot. The ship is so small comparing to the windmill.


f) combination 3 blue dominant contrasting with light green
This image below was taken during house hunting in Farnborough. I saw this bright light green colour bush contrasting with the bright blue metal background I couldn't help taking this picture for my homework. I always think about composition and not only colour relationship.


Summary:
This homework has mad me look at the world differently. I constantly analyse how much colour I can see and with certain composition the combination of colour would be perfect for photograph.
I might not be able to remember hue value of all the colour but I get some idea of how which combination it should be to produce colourfull image.

Excercise - Primary and secondary colours

There are so many colour in nature especially in authumn when all the leaves change colour.
But to find certain colour dominant in an image, it is more difficult. The primary and secondary colour I could think of that occur in nature is colour of trees, grass, flowers, fruits, vegetable, rocks, sky etc
even sky has different colour depending on time of the day.

Primary colour:- Yellow, Red, Blue

Yellow:
At the time of this homework, it's authumn and there is no flower left. The leaves are changing colour but there is no yellow dominant in them. So I could only think of lemon.
And market stalls are great place to find colour.
This image was taken at one market stall in Croydon. I did took a few of lemon from different stalls but I like this one below the most because they stack on top of each other.
as meter reading


+1/2 stop brighter


-1/2 stop darker


Red:
I took this image from one of the market stalls as well. The colour of these tomatoes are so vibrant.
as meter reading


+1/2 stop brighter


-1/2 stop darker


Blue:
I took this image below at Beddington park on Sunday morning. the sky was so clear and the Sun just came up. I didn't have to use PL filter at all.
as meter reading


+1/2 stop brighter


-1/2 stop darker


Secondary colour:- Orange, Violet, Green

Orange:
This image below also was taken at one of the market stalls. I could have taken photos of pumpkin because it's Halloween season but I like this image more because of thos cut in half orange.
as meter reading


+1/2 stop brighter


-1/2 stop darker


Violet:
I didn't think I could find violet at all. I thought all the flowers would have gone by now but luckily I found these flowers in Beddington park one morning. I zoomed in close so the colour could fill the frame. Even though there is some yellow but I think the violet is more dominant in the image.
as meter reading


+1/2 stop brighter


-1/2 stop darker


Green:
The leaves are changing colour but not the one below, yet. I like how the green is not too dark and when it's lit by the morning light, it looks even lighter.
as meter reading


+1/2 stop brighter


-1/2 stop darker


Summary:
The -1/2 darker makes the colour look deeper while the +1/2 brighter tend to wash the colour out.
Some of the images look better with darker such as sky but some look better, in my opinion, with the camera meter reading as is.

Part THREE: Colour -- Exercise: Control the strength of a colour

Using tripod with ISO 100 constant, I took a photo of a painted door which has dark red in colour.

The images were taken in one late afternoon at about 6pm. The painted door was under a cloudy evening sky so the colour itself appeared normal and not too bright comparing to if I had taken during a bright sunny day.

a) f/5.6 1/15 sec
produced the strongest colour
The Brightest area: where the lightest paint appear on the surface
R=114, G=14 and B=12
The darkest area: where the paint is accumulated
R=20, G=16 and B=13


b) f/5.6 1/8 sec
This colour of this image looks closest to the real colour. I think the main reason is that camera will try to average the tone out.
The Brightest area: where the lightest paint appear on the surface
R=170, G=38 and B=26
The darkest area: where the paint is accumulated
R=48, G=24 and B=24



c) f/5.6 1/5 sec
average setting which looks lighter in colour to the real one.
The Brightest area: where the lightest paint appear on the surface
R=216, G=74 and B=72
The darkest area: where the paint is accumulated
R=66, G=31 and B=38
or
R=74, G=19 and B=23


d) f/5.6 1/2 sec
The Brightest area: where the lightest paint appear on the surface
R=255, G=142 and B=155
The darkest area: where the paint is accumulated
R=105, G=35 and B=45


e) f/5.6 1 sec
This image looks like a "washed out" colour, pale and colour nearly disappeared.
The Brightest area: where the lightest paint appear on the surface
R=255, G=195 and B=204
The darkest area: where the paint is accumulated
R=169, G=78 and B=93


Summary:
1)The higher the exposure, the brighter the colour and the RGB value is approaching 255 which means the overall colour is approaching "white"
2)The lower the exposure, the darker the colour and the RGB value is approaching 0 which means overall colour is approaching "black"