The Topic for Crit 2 : COLOR
For now we will concentrate on the straighter end of color, and then will get to all the weird stuff for the next Topic. I want to make sure you know how to control color by what you shoot, when you shoot, and how you should.
Remember that the Topic is merely the technical side of it. The Content, the subject of what you're shooting, still is completely up to you. These photographs have to be about what YOU are interested in before anybody else can be interested in them. If you just shoot for an assignment then you're shooting somebody else's photographs.
There are three lectures that you should read through:
• The first is mostly text and is about Color Theory:
[some of it gets into Photoshop adjustments and information about printing that are not particularly relevant for this class so you can skip over those paragraphs.]
http://www.berk-edu.com/DIGI_subsite/PDF_dp/BasicColorPhotography.pdf
http://www.berk-edu.com/DIGI_subsite/PDF_dp/BasicColorPhotography.pdf
• The next is about how to work wht color to produce various emotional responses:
There are several phases that I would like you to focus on:
Nonochrome = no color, which is where we started with the B&W shots,
but what happens if you should color pictures of things that have no color?
Monochrome = 1 color; try shooting things with predominately 1 color.
Harmonious Color = expands to include several colors that are all very close
Complimentary Color = opposite colors; e.g <red - cyan>, <green - magenta>, <blue - yellow>
Read through the rest of the topics and see what works for your personal vision.
• The third is about shooting Color at Night, and it is a slide show web page
More thoughts on shooting in Color:
Color photography is a lot harder than black & white. This is because when the black & white process removes all of the color, it injects a sense of a mystery. Color photos however quite often look too damned real. Mystery is a most important element in making compelling images. If your viewer can identify objects in the photograph quickly, then they will stop looking. This makes an unsuccessful print. You have to make photographs that pose questions rather revealing answers. [if your photos just provide information and do not engage the viewer in a dialog, then that is photojournalist. This is not better or worse than art-photo, but it is different. (This doesn't mean you can't use a photojournalist style, but...) (there is no black or white in these classifications, just shades of gray.)
So we are looking for photographs reveal the eye, the heart and the mind of the photographer. We do not want photographs of things, we want photos of you looking at things. This is the difference between passive and active photography. Passive photographs, pictures of things, fall to the documentary side. These are objective, and art tends to be about subjectivity. As Cartier-Bresson said, "ideas are not interesting. It is opinions on facts..." In the long run what is interesting is learning about how someone (the photo artist) sees the world, and how much of their personality they share with you. It is about their personal vision (that includes the visual, the emotional and the conceptual aspects of their being) and how that resonates with your own personal vision. Who wants to look at work made by someone who doesn't share you point of view? (Although sometimes contrariness can be stimulating!) (you're not making art until you piss someone off!)
Please remember to not forget all the visual tools you picked up during the first project in B&W. Closeness, angle of view and dramatic lighting are still key elements. In fact, they are even more important now.
Please re-read the Photo Clichés handout. Classic color clichés are sunsets. Photographs that are taken only for color effect remain in the physical domain only. We are looking for photos with emotional impact.
Please look at work by the following Photo Artists
on the RESEARCH pages on the berk-edu.com site:
PLACES : COLOR
Jan Staller, Arthur Ollman : color at night
John Divola (color), John Divola (bw): vandalism
Naoya Hatakeyama : night landscape
Joel Sternfeld, Alan Cohen : landscape in memorium
John Pfahl : altered landscape, beautiful pollution; windows
PEOPLE : COLOR
Nan Golden : the ballad of sexual dependency
Joyce Tennyson : studio portraits
Pierre & Gilles : beautiful people
Gregory Crewdson : staged dramas
Lucas Samaris : altered polaroids
