what is up everybody it is Monday which
means photo assignments photo
assignments are these bi-weekly photo
challenges that we are doing to improve
our skills with creative thinking and
overall abilities as photographers this
week's photo assignment is RED - using
the idea of red as our photo assignment
this week is definitely a conceptual
thing to do but I want to talk a little
bit about that in this video and I want
to talk about color usage in photography
particularly using a single color such
as red as an accent and certainly humans
have different emotional responses and
different memories associated with
colors and those are going to be played
out both from the photographer's
standpoint in what you're trying to
create and in the viewers standpoint
from how they react a certain color
usage in photographs but I want to talk
a little bit about this and what's
interesting is historically where we are
today with photography is very different
from where we were in the pre-digital
world before digital cameras you would
have black and white or color film so it
was a very deliberate usage of either
one in fact one of my favorite
photographers Harry Gruyaert wonderful
Belgian photographer and one of the
things he has said in interviews before
is that he approaches color and
black-and-white photography very
differently that way it affects
composition and the way he says it is
very poetic is that in color photography
it's almost like an enhanced sense it's
like the flavor of food it has a very
sensual quality to it and I think it's a
really beautiful way of putting it and I
think it is true that before digital we
would definitely as photographers
approach those two things very
differently certain things work with
color and composition that you would
treat differently than when you're just
shooting black and white and today that
is very backwards because in the digital
era digital cameras shoot in color with
the exception of maybe one Leica model
that is a monochrome model but digital
cameras shooting color and we think of
what we're going to do in
post-production and we can really do
anything in post-production we can
generate a black and white image we can
selectively replace colors in an image
and that has different effects on it but
I think it's the mindset of assuming
that we can always do something in
post-production that affects and maybe even
makes us lazy in the way we approach it
and so I want to talk about a very
deliberate usage today of color palette
if you are not familiar with the concept
of a color palette what it is - is within
any visual composition
whether it's a photograph or a painting or
even a three-dimensional work like a
sculpture what colors are represented
how do they relate to one another and
how are they being used and this is
really interesting it even derives its
name from the flat surface that a painter
would use to mix colors on before
applying them to a canvas now
photography is a little bit different
and in some kinds of photography if
you're doing a still life or a studio
type shot you do have a degree of
control over what will be in the
composition and how colors relate to one
another and you can compose it as such
however unlike painting and sculpture
when you get into improvisational
photography so mediums like street
photography this becomes very difficult
because you're just improvising with
what's around you the way you would
compose that I think why so many
photographers have shot in black and
white is it keeps that element of
clutter away from it but what's
interesting is when you start to look at
some really good examples of this whole
improvised idea of photography and how
that relates to color and we're going to
look at some examples in a second it
gets really interesting it is clearly
beyond the scope of this video to do a
comprehensive overview of color theory
but I did do a video on that a few years
ago so if you are interested in learning
more I will link up to that at the end
of this video as well as in the show
description before we look at images
though I do want to talk about some
basic concepts of color theory so you'll
know what it is that you're looking at
and what we're talking about and so
typically we use a color wheel to
determine the relationships that colors
have between one another what we're
seeing here is the color wheel in all of
the gradients as the colors
transition through one another - right
now you're seeing two selections on this
color wheel the colors red and green and
these are complete opposites on the
color wheel colors that are opposite of
one another are typically referred to as
complementary colors now complementary
colors have a very bold effect when they
are used they are very high contrast
they almost work in the same way that
black and white do even though they're
in color if that makes sense but they're
usually used to have a very striking
effect and we'll see some images that
actually use complementary colors in a
second another interesting technique
that you see more deliberately in
composition that uses color - colors
that are neighbors on the color wheel so
for instance the relationship of blue
and red and we're talking about red
today so looking at how those colors
relate to one another it has a very cool
maybe a darker quality to it it's very
different than
another color combination that you see
quite a bit which is red and orange or
red and yellow now red and yellow has a
very different effect it has a very
dramatic high-energy effect it's very
warm in tone and it's interesting when
you start to look at color combinations
and as I said before these color
palettes in these images to see how they
relate and why the photographer was
looking for that specific combination I
put together a group of images here that
for me at least represent some of my
favorite color photographers in the last
50 or 60 years and what I want you to
see in here is how limiting your color
palette not only provides a much
stronger result in the end but when you
do want to use an accent color like a
red it brings a much stronger emphasis
to that color I want to start with Ernst
Haas who is I think seminal when it comes
to color photography he started
experimenting with Kodachrome when he
came to the U.S. in the early 50's - this
is one of his more well-known images it
has a high nostalgic feel to it a sense
of memory associated with the road trip
and you see only three colors being used
here a lot of blues a lot of deep dark
blues it's nothing ever really goes to
black but the bottom part of the image
where you see the reflection of the sky
it's essentially blue you see the red on
the motor inn vacancy sign and then it's
kind of a yellow light that's behind
that so it's a very limited color
palette but it really draws your eye in
particularly to that Motel sign and I
think it's very effective and of course
Haas was the master of accent colors and
this is one of my favorite images which
is a little red dot in the shadow of a
building and so we're up so close it
almost appears abstract and upon further
inspection you realize that is the top
of a traffic light at the bottom of the
picture and the shadow kind of points
your eye in that direction the red is
emphasized and the only other color
other than the slight yellow light is a
little stream of blue sky those on the
right hand side of the image and so it's
highly effective another one is great
just generally because there's not a lot
of color on the scene that's being shot
you have this huge pattern that's
essentially kind of a gray and white but
the little red umbrella and I mentioned
this over and over again when I've done
composition episodes but if you can
creatively put a point of emphasis near
an edge it does draw attention to that
point of emphasis so our eyes want to
see things you know fall naturally at
basically the mid point of
the composition but if you have things
that are closer to the edge they bring
attention out that draws interest and I
think that's really important another
great colorist was Saul Leiter and he was very
much known for the street photography
that he did and he loved things like
reflections and raindrops and lights
reflecting in windows and he created
these wonderful abstracts now the
interesting thing about Saul is you do
see certain color palettes repeat in his
work like you know the red umbrellas in
the snow for instance but in the images
that are a little more involved like
this one which is abstract to a degree
you see shapes of things but it is a
color palette and is full of
reds, yellows and maybe some dark blues
there's a little bit of green in there but
the predominant colors that are here are the
reds against those darker
darker blues or purples and it has a
very strong effect to it - you see it also
here less abstract but with the red
umbrella that pops out and brings
emphasis another very famous image is
this one that uses sub framing was shot
between some boards but he left a color
in on that and it creates almost a Mark
Rothko effect with a scene in the middle
and it's quite wonderful other
famous image - and this has a lot more
going on but again a very highly
restricted color palette and so we're
looking at really blues and reds in this
case so no complementary colors nothing
that's too high contrast, they are neighboring
colors and these are the palettes that
Saul like to use now Saul was also a
painter and so I have no doubt that this
was something that he thought about and put
a lot of emphasis on when shooting these
street photographs I think they were
certain color combinations he would look
for and if they were to happen within a
composition that's at the point where
you click the shutter and he was so
wonderful at that another wonderful
photographer is the magnum photographer
the Belgian born Harry Gruyaert and
Harry is amazing - he uses very
similar color palettes to what we see in
Saul's work but in his own way and so
again the blues and the reds a little
bit of yellow in the 26 on the gate
nember of the on the terminal here and
and again with this photo which reminds
me somewhat if the Saul picture was
shooting between the boards but you have
these colors that are framing in the
rest of the composition of course being
a magnum photographer he's going to be
way less abstract but his use of color
was absolutely
brilliant - this is a great one too of this seascape
but being shot so you see the neon sign
and then a little bit of green on the
other sign but a very limited color
palette now these are the cooler end of
the spectrum with the blues and the
greens that go with the red but if you
look at this one which introduces yellow
into the equation it has a very
different feel to it and this one has
much more energy it's much warmer
there's heat coming from this
it's just a hotter feel to it because
again limited color palette but rather
than go with the blue side of things we
move the color wheel to the next notch
over and you're combining red with
yellow another photographer I want to
look at who's a little more
controversial who does go very bold and
uses a lot of complementary colors in
his work is William Eggleston and with
William Eggleston that is part of the
point and his most famous image being
the red ceiling which has a complete
creepy feel to it - it's very seedy why is
the room and the ceiling painted red
what's with the tape and all the plugs
going into the light and it seems almost
dangerous in the sense but those are all
the wonderful things even the lack of
any thought to the composition
apparently that are what make William
Eggleston I think so amazing and he
always goes for bold and always goes for
a statement not only in the pose of this
woman but she's in a red dress and
you're seeing that with the
complementary color of the green blinds
next to her - the famous tricycle
image also uses complementary colors so
reds and greens I wonder if this image
would have a very different feel if it
were mapped to different colors which
would be interesting again with the
Christmas lights that are hanging on
this column here reds and greens they're
complementary colors the chairs the side
of the fence another one I think is
great it's more of an orange and green
so we start to move away from that color
palette it's still very bold very strong
makes a statement but the fruit in
contrast to the sink and that's William
Eggleston that's what he was going for
which was something that was more
shocking in your face and bold and
there's a look to it a more modern
photographer who I think is quite
interesting is Dan Winters who I haven't
talked about quite some time but he
specializes in celebrity portrait work
and he has a very fixed palette that he
tends to use on a lot of his portraits so
there's a there's a very uniform look to
them and it's almost like other than the
slightly green backdrop that he goes out
of his way to avoid other colors
especially red if you look at pictures
he's done of women
you know the lips are never a
hard red lipstick it's always more of an
orange something more subdued and laid
back and then when he does use red with
the famous portrait is a Fred Rogers
with his famous red sweater it has a
really interesting impact and and even
the accent color I'm the portrait he did
of Heath Ledger with the red socks has a
really great effect to it but I think
it's because you're used to seeing with
Dan Winters the avoidance of color
usually another great photographer that
I want to at least include on this - a huge
influence on me and a lot of other
people is Gregory Crewdson who is a
well-known contemporary fine art
photographer I have met Crewdson before
and I did not talk about color with him
because it wasn't something I was
thinking about the time but Crewdson is
interesting because he does photographs
that pivot somewhere between paintings and
movie sets and it's interesting that
photography can be the linchpin between
those two mediums in some ways and I
think you see that in Crewdson's work but
what's interesting is there's always a
narrative that's going on these are high
production images that he makes
with enormous attention paid to details
like lighting and color and what's
interesting is the way he uses red and
red usually has a very specific purpose
in this image which is one of my
favorites an outdoor scene but its the color
that building and it brings emphasis to
it but more specifically you see it in
the narrative you don't know necessarily
what the story is with this woman next
to the car here looking on and there's
smoke in the background - were we just
visited by aliens? How did
we get here but her bag is red and you
see red used as that point of emphasis
quite a bit here's another one where we
have a spotlight coming from up above
and you see red is an accent color in
the background another interesting one
with the couple lying watching television
and she has… in this case he's using red
to tie together relationships in the
room perhaps he's sitting in a red chair
she's wearing a red skirt and so you
could use a color like that and look how
limited is and the attention to not
using red anywhere else in the image and
it's very important I think in these the
brake lights are all that you see
redness and
and it would change it a lot if you saw
something different another one of his
famous images is the woman and the boy
at the dinner table and you see a lot of
greens a lot of blues even some yellows
and what's red? The food and her sweater
and so a very deliberate use of palette
that Crewdson is giving us here but this
is what I want you guys to pay attention
to is what colors are being used I think
it's so… maybe it's the natural thing for
photographers to do just to start aiming
and shooting the camera without thinking
about how these color relationships play
into one another and it's not easy to do
and then there's a whole thing of
photography that comes after all that
that you've got to pay attention to but
this is what separates some of the
greatest images and makes them some of
the greatest images I hope this is
giving you a few ideas for our photo
assignment this week which is red and I
think it's really important to
understand relationships between colors
and how they function in a color palette
so that you can get the most emphasis
out of using a color such as red for an
accent color or maybe you want to use it
very predominantly but how do those
relationships work and what's going to
draw emphasis to what it is that you're
trying to do with that color now the way
photo assignments work is I have done a
video on the topic this week so next
Monday I'm going to do a video featuring
some of the best images submitted on
social media if you would like to
participate you want to use a hashtag on
Instagram or Twitter and the hashtag is
#photoassignments you can use the
hashtag on facebook as well but maybe a
better idea is go over to the Facebook
page for the Art of Photography I will
link that in the description and you
will see an opportunity in there with a
thread where you can post your images
directly into that thread and I can pull
them from there I've already seen a lot
of really cool work submitted and I'm really
excited about this so a lot of cool
stuff coming up this week I have one
item of business that I want to talk to
you guys about - translations now I have
had a few people contact me lately
offering to translate the back catalogue
of videos that I've done into other
languages which is a very generous offer
and a very daunting task that is a lot
of work to this video I have probably
560 some odd videos that I've done
before and that's a lot of stuff and it
can be a group effort YouTube has
recently introduced a feature where you
can contribute a translation if you
would like you'll see it below the
player it's on the website version
there's a little button with dots on and
you click on
for more and you can submit a
translation I have had four people
submit translations already there have
been two into italian one into
Portuguese and my Alexey Titarenko
documentary was done into French the
problem with the YouTube system is I
can't see who did the translations and
this is a problem because I want to say
thank you that is a really nice and
generous thing to do I obviously take
these videos very seriously and I think
the whole idea of having them be in a
format that people who are hearing
impaired or non-english speakers can
access is very important so if you are
one of those people please hit me up on
Twitter I would like to say thank you
and I want to credit you in the show
description - its the least I can do if you
want to contribute a translation of a
video that you like into another
language I need to give you a little
heads up on how YouTube works so all of
the videos I've ever done have at least
a machine translation applied to them
and by machine translation I mean the
google robot has gone through and tried
to write what I'm saying it's fairly
accurate at times and at times it's
downright surreal and comical and so
recently meaning this year I have made a
commitment to at least offer an English
transcription to every video so when you
go to the closed caption button it is
accurate and I have only done the last
30 or so videos I've gotten used to the
little YouTube system of how it works in
there and I can go through pretty
quickly because it was me talking and if
I did it within 24 hours of recording
the video I can usually get it without
having to spend too much time on it so
really only videos that have been done
this year have had that applied and you
can tell which ones because they have a
little closed caption signal on them and
so that is one thing to bear in mind so
you might not want to do a video that
doesn't have that but if there is a
video that you are interested in again
hit me up on Twitter and contact me
because I'd love to work something out
and I would love to thank you and
express appreciation to those who have
offered translations already I just
can't see who you are so anyway I will
link up to the color theory video if you
want to learn more about that and as
always if you've enjoyed this video
please remember to like it share it
subscribe to the Art of Photography for
more videos we'll see you guys in the
next one until then later
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