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ALONGSIDE LIGHT AND COMPOSITION, COLOUR IS A HUGE INFLUENCE FOR PHOTOGRAPHY. UNDERSTANDING COLOUR
THEORYANDHOWIT CANHELP– ORHINDER– YOURIMAGESWILLASSISTYOUTOFINDANDCREATEBET TERPICTURESWords: JORDAN BUT TERSC
OLOUR: IT'S SOMETHING that we
take for granted, so much so that our
reactions to how colour affects and
influences us are buried deep in our
psyche. Most of us will notice if a hue is
pleasing or if colours clash or complement
each other, but there's a lot more that goes
on subconsciously.
You don't need to fully understand colour
psychology – yes that is a thing – to
recognise that colour has the power to
adjust our emotions, health and perceptions,
even our taste. There's a reason why green
Ketchup didn't catch on and why traffic
lights use red to signal cars to stop. While
how people are affected by different colour
stimuli varies from person to person, there
are many consistencies in the way colour
influences our behaviour and perceptions
that enable us to manipulate colour to our
advantage. Open up a magazine or turn on
the TV and you’ll be hard-pressed not to
notice examples of how colour is used to
subliminally communicate with viewers.
Carefully constructed colours are used in
marketing, branding and even television
shows to make us feel a certain way.
Colour's power is indisputable so knowing
how to consciously use it in your images is
more important than you might think. It canattract attention to an image as a whole, be
used to guide the viewer to a certain part,
and to control the reaction to a picture.
What’s more, in digital photography
colour is easily manipulated, both in-camera
and during processing, so forming an
understanding of how to best use colour,
and how to adjust the colours in your
images to suit the intended impact, can be
very powerful skills. We’ve not the space to
cover every aspect of the topic in full detail,
but over the next ten pages, we’ll explain
some of the theory behind colour in
photography, as well as demonstrate some
examples of how and when you can use
colour to your advantage...