Realistic color combination and Subjective color combination

The color in films is not static, it changes with different frames and different plots. It can creating atmosphere and characters in films, such as highlighting the theme of the story.

There are two ways of color combinations in films-realistic color combination and subjective color combination. Realistic color combination is to use the nature color which comes from human's visual experiences, such as green grass, blue sky, golden sun, etc. Audience will enjoy the natural color as they expected before. We often use analogous colors to create realistic color combination to make the frame more vivid and enjoyable.

Subjective color combination is to use specific color on an object that we never seen or we are not easy to seen in the natural world. It comes from human’s mind, People use imagination create this kind of colour combinations. This type of color combination can create character’s personality in films, and it also can express director’s fancy thoughts.

Like this experimental test. I shot one scene that a person poured a glass of orange juice, and then change the orange juice to red, blue and green. And then I invite some people to watch this video to get some feedback, most people can accept the red juice, they thought it might be carrot juice or water melon juice. The green one and the blue one looks very strange, they feel a little bit disgusting and don’t want to drink it.

Because of human’s previous life experience, so people will react differently feeling with different color. We can use Realistic color combination to create people’s normal life, and use subjective color creates some especially effects.

The history and science of colour film

In the early days of film production，Hand Tinting was a widely practiced technique of painting colors onto the film itself. The first hand tinted movie, Annabelle Serpentine Dance, was filmed in Edison's Black Maria Studios. Annabelle Moore, a young dancer from Broadway, is dressed in white veils that appear to change.

As film became an international mass media industry, even stencils could not meet the demands of production. Filmmakers began using bath processes to tint and tone their films. Tinting involved putting the film in a bath of dye – this would turn the entire frame a particular color. Toning on the other hand only colored the dark parts of the frame by chemically converting the silver in the film to colored silver salts.

The first major venture into capturing color naturally in motion picture came in 1908 with Charles Urban and the Natural Color Kinematograph Company. The Kinemacolor system, invented by George Albert Smith was a sequential two color additive process.

 

KINEMACOLOR CAMERA

In the camera, one frame would be captured with a red filter and the next frame with a green filter and back and forth. When played back with a projector with a red green filter fly wheel, the red and green sequential images would “add” together because of our persistence of vision. The result was a surprising good color image despite being only a two color system.

In the 1990s, many filmmakers explored different lab processes such as bleach bypass to create unique film tones. Moving into the 2000s, computers had become powerful enough to handle entire films. Digital intermediaries came into use – a process of scanning a film frame by frame into a computer to be digitally manipulated.

The first film to get the digital intermediary treatment for the entire film was The Coen Brother’s O Brother Where Art Thou – in 2001. Cinematographer Roger Deakins worked for 11 weeks toning down the lush green summer foliage to achieve a dusty golden desaturated look.

Reference:

The History and Science of Color Film: From Isaac Newton to the Coen Brothers | FilmmakerIQ.com. 2013. The History and Science of Color Film: From Isaac Newton to the Coen Brothers | FilmmakerIQ.com. [ONLINE] Available at: http://filmmakeriq.com/lessons/the-history-and-science-of-color-film-from-isaac-newton-to-the-coen-brothers/. [Accessed 08 September 2013].

Summary of my study

Basic color theory

Let’s talk about the aesthetics of color. No understanding of color in film can be complete without a real solid grounding in the basic tenets of color theory.

We’ll start with the RGB color wheel – this color wheel is a little different from the color wheels you can find in art stores but this is the one used in color suites. Our three primary colors are Red Green and Blue. The colors that bridge the arc between the primary colors are made combining the two primary colors together. The area inside the color wheel is made of colors that are created when adding the third primary color into the mix. When all three primary colors are combined equally and fully they create white – this is an additive system.

This is a picture of color relationship – opposite colors called complementary colors. Drawing a line from a primary color through the middle of the circle we find that the opposite of Red is Cyan. The opposite of Green is Magenta and the opposite of Blue is Yellow.

Complementary colors when placed next to each other create strongest of color contrasts. And the least color contrast most harmonious color combinations are called analogous colors which are colors that lie next to each other along the color wheel.

Reference:

Introduction to Color in Digital Filmmaking | FilmmakerIQ.com. 2013. Introduction to Color in Digital Filmmaking | FilmmakerIQ.com. [ONLINE] Available at: http://filmmakeriq.com/lessons/introduction-to-color-in-digital-filmmaking/. [Accessed 08 September 2013].

Comparative research

During the research, I made a short film. In the short film, I made a comparison between black and white sequences and colored sequences, in order to test the audience. I put this short film on the internet, and send the questionnaire to 30 people who are general audience, ask them watch the film and get some feedback from them.

Most people thought that the colorful things bring people happier feelings. Compare with the black and white part, some people think it's not suit for the story, so the images with black and white looks a little bit strange, and some people can not be attracted with the black and white images. Some other people think that black and white part is more silent, dark and deep. They feel like some bad things will happen.

Compare with The kaleidoscope part and the green screen part. I found that the viewers can't focused on massive no meaning colors for long time, they don't know what objects is this color on. During the kaleidoscope part, most viewers confused about what is it, and after a short period, they feel boring. Compare with the specific color (like the green screen part, colors on an objects, although it is not very natural), but the audience can continue to stay in the story and they will not feel bored very easily.