nathanaardvark
patreon
Tutorial 80 - Color Temperature & Depth
🕑 Added 2016-03-21 11:07:56 +0000 UTCColor temperature can have a really strong impact on our spacial perception. Though, value also has a lot to do with it, as noted in a previous tutorial (see tutorial 16 www.patreon.com/posts/tutorial-16-4166200).
It's not only extremely useful to be aware of this effect for landscapes and environments, with any level of depth, but also for our compositions. Film makers often make use of this trick. You'll notice in crowd scenes the protagonist is wearing red while all other characters are blueish, green or grey. This has an instant pop effect. It's nothing new either, renaissance painters often depicted Jesus in red.
In my demo image I've chosen to paint the fields a warm dry color, to emphasize the effect, however, a warm green tone will do just as well.
Comments
Nah man, it's all I needed to know. And I shall check out the Pixar thing. Thank you!
Nathan Aardvark
So, if we tried creating a painting of a portrait, rather than a landscape, using these same beautiful color combinations (pinks, violets, reds and peaches) we'd be communicating a similar sense of unusual but somewhat familiar beauty. We might see a picture of a woman sitting in a chair, but subconsciously we're feeling like we're looking at a beautiful sunset. This is how powerful painting can be. Once we start to really observe what's happening in the world around us we can start to decode it and do all sorts of wonderful things. Playing with our circuits of perception, cross-wiring things. Brands will take this to the extreme. The most successful brands know exactly how to use color to take advantage of our emotional circuits. YIKES! Look at the Patreon logo, it's orange, like the color of a sunset...whether that's intentional or not, the effect is one of joy and warmth. :) Also, google "pixar color script" to see how color can be used over time to guide emotions. Sorry, went way off there!
Nathan Aardvark
For sure! This is a really interesting image and gives us an unusual sense when we look at it, like "what!? Those bright pink mountains!" because we're so unfamiliar with seeing bright pink mountains. They actually appear to pop out! Now, one reason why we're still convinced that these bright pink mountains sit behind the ones in front of them is because of a hue and saturation shift. starting from the top of bright pink mountains peeks, (which are bright and saturated) we move down, visually, towards the purple mountains. Just before we hit those mountains we can see the is quite a strong shift in temperature from hot pink to cool violet. This gives us a sense that these mountains are being effected by the atmosphere . Another reason these mountains seem to be in the far distance is because of overlap, which is a illustrated a little in this tutorial: <a href="https://www.patreon.com/posts/tutorial-17-4170092">https://www.patreon.com/posts/tutorial-17-4170092</a> So what practical stuff can we get from this? If we hadn't seen this photograph (and assuming it hasn't been altered) and had seen a painting of a scene using the same color/value structure we might have reacted like "oh, that's a nice painting but or course, it's not based on anything observed in nature, it's just too unusual looking!" but of course, we'd be wrong. There are times when the sky looks like this, just not often. So, if we want to give our audience that feeling of unusual beauty then we can try to that in the same way nature does. Like in this photo.
What about a planet with a different atmospheric light? Or just something like this <a href="http://amazingpict.com/purple-mountain-sunset/" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">http://amazingpict.com/purple-mountain-sunset/</a> ? Would they be the exception?
