A NALOGOUSCOLOURS:Theseare probably
the easiest colours to find and use, especially
in outdoor or landscape photography, as
they’re the types of colours most abundant
in nature. Analogous colours are those that
sit directly alongside each other on the
tertiary colour wheel – for example red,
red-orange and orange, or alternatively
blue, blue-green, and green, and the subtle
shades in-between. It’s as simple as picking
a colour and then looking at the colours
either side of it on the colour wheel. When
used together, these colours create images
with low colour-contrast, are largely
harmonies synonymous with the natural
world, and can be almost monochromatic in
nature (in the sense of lacking colour
contrast rather than being black & white).
For example, think of the colours you’d
expect to see in an autumnal woodland –
they’re mostly analogous reds, oranges and
shades in between. The same woodland in
spring will also be analogous shades of
green, yellow and subtle hues in-between.THERE’SWELL-BACKEDTHEORY
BEHINDWHYWEPERCEIVECOLOURS
THEWAYWEDOANDHOWTOUSE
THISTO YOURADVANTAGE...COLOUR:
THE BASICS
56 Digital SLR Photography May 2019
MO
T T
RODEHEAVE
R/UNSPLA
SHANTHONYCANTIN/UNSPLASHNATURE’S HUES
Complementary colours in nature:
the crimson poppy stands out
against the green crops behind.THECOLOURWHEEL
The colour wheel is a very useful tool for quickly visualising
which colours sit well together, and which ones create
contrast when paired with each another.M
OST PEOPLE,IF not everyone, will
have seen a colour wheel at some
point in their lives – even if your
memory flashes back to art classes in
school, a quick refresher on what the colour
wheel is and how it relates to digital
photography is always useful. The most
basic colour wheel is a circle consisting of
three segments: the primary colours (red,
yellow and blue). By mixing two adjacent
primary colours we arrive at the secondary
colours (green, orange and purple), and then
bymixingadjacentcoloursin thisnewwheel
wearriveat thetertiarycolours(yellow-
green, yellow-orange, red-orange,
red-purple, blue-purple, and blue-green).
You can keep on mixing adjacent hues to
arrive at even more colours, each blending
more seamlessly with the last, although this
third stage is probably all we need to be
aware of. The colour wheel is useful as a
reference point for understanding what
colours work well together in creating
harmony or contrast – we’re not suggesting
that you print it out and carry it around with
you, as after time you’ll soon develop an
understanding of what hues work well
alongside each another.
Whencoloursarearrangedin a pleasing
wayin photographiccompositions,they’re
saidtobein harmony.Colour harmony can
be achieved with two basic approaches:
using analogous colours (colours that are
similar to one another); or complementary
colours (colours that are opposite on the
colour wheel). There are also several more
advanced theories based on each approach- enough to fill an entire magazine – but
we'll just be covering these two basic
theories primarily.
COLOUR HARMONY