Color elements in photography

Three characteristics of color: When adjusting color, there are three very important indicators that every photographer should pay close attention to. These are the three characteristics of color-hue, lightness and saturation.

Hue (hue) is an intuitive feeling of color, which is usually expressed by the name of a subject (for example, a blue car, a red hat, etc. ).

Brightness (sometimes called brightness or illuminance) is a measure of color brightness or gray scale (in the case of removing hue, just like black-and-white photography). You can imagine that a blue car and a green hat have the same brightness.

Saturation (or chroma) usually refers to the purity, vividness or intensity of a color. This is a description of color purity. You can find a tomato and a red brick. They may have the same hue (tomatoes may be greener and red bricks may be redder). But in terms of color saturation, the red color of tomato is purer and more conspicuous than the red color of red brick. In addition, there are many factors that affect color saturation. The color saturation of the photos taken by the camera depends on the physical characteristics of the objects in the scene and the illumination of the scene.

Color temperature: Whether shooting with digital camera or film, color temperature is an important factor that affects the visual impact and visual effect of photos. In other words, only a slight change in color temperature can greatly change the effect of the picture and directly affect the viewer's feeling of the photo. For example, the white shirt we see with the naked eye is white in the sun or under the light. However, the color tendencies of these two light sources are completely different. Our brains will compensate this difference in the same way, making us feel that the colors of objects are the same under different light sources. Only the camera will truthfully record the color changes brought by the color temperatures of different light sources. Therefore, it is very important to know what the color temperature is first.

Definition of color temperature: Color temperature is a method specially used to measure and calculate the color components of light. It was founded by the British physicist Lord Kelvin at the end of 19. He developed a set of color temperature calculation method, the specific standard is based on the wavelength emitted by a blackbody radiator.

Low color temperature light source is characterized by relatively more red radiation in energy distribution, which is usually called "warm light"; After the color temperature rises, the proportion of blue radiation in the energy distribution increases, which is usually called "cold light". The color temperature of some common light sources is: standard candle light is 1930K (Kelvin-day); Tungsten lamp 2760-2900K；; The fluorescent lamp is 3000 k; Flash 3800 k; At noon, the sunshine is 5500 k; Electronic flash 6000 k; The blue sky is 12000- 18000K.

Pre-set white balance function: common ones are sunlight, shadow, cloudy day, flash, tungsten lamp and fluorescent light. You can set these options to suit the light that illuminates the subject.

Setting the "wrong" white balance can add some emotion to the photo. Once you understand this concept, you can use it to create powerful photos.

Tip: If you use JPEG format, you should set the white balance accurately when shooting. It will be difficult to adjust in the future. Although you can adjust the color balance, it is different from adjusting the white balance, which may produce unpredictable results.

If shooting in RAW format, you can adjust the white balance later through RAW software. This is also one of the reasons for shooting with RAW. If necessary, you can adjust the white balance later or change it to create some artistic effects.

Try to change the white balance when shooting portraits. Setting the white balance of the camera to cloudy will add beautiful and pleasing warm colors to the photos. The results are similar to those obtained by using daylight white balance film and 8 1B filter.