Selective Coloring?

DRT-MaverickDRT-Maverick Registered Users Posts: 476 Major grins
edited September 19, 2005 in People
Recently I was looking at Kasey's photograph of the rose with the people in the background, and higgmeister mentioned selective coloring. Here's my attempt. Give any suggestions if you feel like it. :)


personphoto2sd.jpg

The girl's natural eye color is blue. I wanted to bring attention to her eyes in specific, but do you think I should tone down on the saturation?
Pentax K20D 14.6mp Body : Pentax *ist D 6.1mp Body : Pentax ZX10 Body : 180mm Sigma Macro EX lens : 18-55mm Pentax SMC DA Lens : 28-200mm Sigma Lens : 50-500mm Sigma APO DG EX lens : Pentax AF-500FTZ flash : Sigma EX 2x Teleconverter.

Comments

  • John MuellerJohn Mueller Registered Users Posts: 2,555 Major grins
    edited September 16, 2005
    I think you done a very fine job on this.My taste says increase the sat.thumb.gif
    My Smuggy

    Cincinnati Smug Leader
  • andymillsonandymillson Registered Users Posts: 147 Major grins
    edited September 16, 2005
    I agree about the saturation, the pic is great, but the eyes are just a little to pale to stand out well
    A Brit among the HAWKEYES
    Canon 5D Mk III
    Canon 24-105L IS USM; Canon 16-35 f/2.8L USM; Canon 70-200 f/2.8L IS USM II
    Sigma 150mm f/2.8 EX DG HSM; Bigma 50-500 f/4-6.3 EX DG HSM
    My Galleries
  • ruttrutt Registered Users Posts: 6,511 Major grins
    edited September 16, 2005
    Should I tell you what I think?

    http://www.dgrin.com/showthread.php?t=17275
    If not now, when?
  • DRT-MaverickDRT-Maverick Registered Users Posts: 476 Major grins
    edited September 16, 2005
    Well in certain cases it works, and can be fun, even if it's not the best thing on the world. Just imagine Shindler's List without the little girl in the red coat. :)
    Pentax K20D 14.6mp Body : Pentax *ist D 6.1mp Body : Pentax ZX10 Body : 180mm Sigma Macro EX lens : 18-55mm Pentax SMC DA Lens : 28-200mm Sigma Lens : 50-500mm Sigma APO DG EX lens : Pentax AF-500FTZ flash : Sigma EX 2x Teleconverter.
  • thdizzythdizzy Registered Users Posts: 262 Major grins
    edited September 17, 2005
    My eye seems drawn to her arm (which looks outta place). Seems like an un-natural shot.

    IMHO
    Todd Disraeli - Star, Idaho

    Disraeli Photography

    "Only when the last tree has died, the last river poisoned, and the last fish been caught will we realize we cannot eat money" Cree Indian Proverb
  • Yuri PautovYuri Pautov Registered Users Posts: 1,918 Major grins
    edited September 17, 2005
    DRT-Maverick, sorry, but...
    These colors are not friendly (you can read some books and also some material can be found in the Internet about matching colors)

    http://www.usu.edu/teachall/text/disable/programs/match.htm

    http://desktoppub.about.com/cs/color/a/symbolism.htm

    Its a great composition and I think color here is unnecessary thing...

    Spasibo,
    Yuri
  • ruttrutt Registered Users Posts: 6,511 Major grins
    edited September 17, 2005
    DRT-Maverick wrote:
    Well in certain cases it works, and can be fun, even if it's not the best thing on the world. Just imagine Shindler's List without the little girl in the red coat. :)

    Spielberg made Schindler's List in 1993 and at that time the technique was probably still somewhat fresh (I don't know it's history.) Since that time, though, it has completely lost whatever novelty it had. What's more, the idea of using it for eyes is just about the first thing people try. How many times have you seen it before?

    The problem is that selective color is an obvious gimmick. Unlike selective focus or exposure, it is completely unsubtle; it dominates the image and becomes the entire message. As such, it better be a good message. I don't just mean that the image has to be good. I mean that selective color has to be used to convey something worth saying. In this shot, what is that? The beautiful color of her eyes? But isn't she also beautiful? And this isn't a new or particularly interesting message.

    Speilberg's message, by contrast, was pretty complicated. The film was black and white for a number of reasons, among them the fact that it might have been unbearably painful to watch if it had the additional realism of color. He wanted to grant us some additional distance from the characters. Then he used selective color to shatter that illusion and make a powerful connection with a particular character.

    With all that said, you can make people look at the subject's eyes, make them pop, without hitting your viewers over the head with the selective color baseball bat. Look at Yuri's shot here: http://www.dgrin.com/showthread.php?t=18040 Look how hypnotic her eyes are. His recipe says that the only selective thing he did with them was sharpen a bit more than the rest. You could also try steepening the A and B curves in LAB more for the eyes than the rest. There are plenty of ways you could do this without nuking the image.
    If not now, when?
  • ruttrutt Registered Users Posts: 6,511 Major grins
    edited September 17, 2005
    If you post a high res color version of this image I can show you how to use LAB curves and CMYK sharpening to make her eyes stand out without making a selection at all.
    If not now, when?
  • DRT-MaverickDRT-Maverick Registered Users Posts: 476 Major grins
    edited September 17, 2005
    There is no color version of that photo, it was taken on black and white film.
    Pentax K20D 14.6mp Body : Pentax *ist D 6.1mp Body : Pentax ZX10 Body : 180mm Sigma Macro EX lens : 18-55mm Pentax SMC DA Lens : 28-200mm Sigma Lens : 50-500mm Sigma APO DG EX lens : Pentax AF-500FTZ flash : Sigma EX 2x Teleconverter.
  • HiggmeisterHiggmeister Registered Users Posts: 909 Major grins
    edited September 19, 2005
    Hi Tyler,
    I see what you are trying to convey, but I have to agree that it's not needed here. With close-up people pictures, it's natural for the eyes to be the center attention and naturally grabs the viewer. Your model here has beautiful eyes and is quite stunning so there is no need to try and pull more attention to the eyes.

    As some mentioned here, eyes in selective color are cliches. I had a college professor that used to take points off from my English papers because I chose to use cliches to express an idea (I didn't care about the points anyway). I still use them selectively to express an idea in shorthand and do see a place for selective coloring as well. Your selective color doesn't pull the attention away from the subject so I see no harm done though I don't see it adding to the picture either.

    And I have to say that my attempts at selective color have been truly horrible; so bad that I would never torture this community by posting them:D. I have seen some examples where selective coloring made the shot, but only a few.

    Thanks for sharing,
    Chris

    A picture is but words to the eyes.
    Comments are always welcome.

    www.pbase.com/Higgmeister

  • DRT-MaverickDRT-Maverick Registered Users Posts: 476 Major grins
    edited September 19, 2005
    All I have to say " BLUE DARNIT BLUUUUEEEE YARRR YE BE BLUEHATAARRRS!"

    National talk like a pirate day. I know it was cliche, but I just thought it'd be nice to throw it up there to get opinions.

    blue.
    Pentax K20D 14.6mp Body : Pentax *ist D 6.1mp Body : Pentax ZX10 Body : 180mm Sigma Macro EX lens : 18-55mm Pentax SMC DA Lens : 28-200mm Sigma Lens : 50-500mm Sigma APO DG EX lens : Pentax AF-500FTZ flash : Sigma EX 2x Teleconverter.
Sign In or Register to comment.