Projects 32 & 33 - Primary and Secondary Colours

Ok so I have been reshooting some flower photos for my colour wheel for these 2 projects. I know that the brief isn't to produce a colour wheel by the way, but as I'm no longer submitting this for assessment I am having a bit of fun along the way!

I used a 105mm macro lens to isolate the flowers, but didn't use extension tubes as I was shooting outside and it was a bit breezy.

Yellow - daffodils are everywhere and that includes in my garden!




This was the cameras auto exposure which came in at 1/250 f4. I was happy with the yellow but still tried an alternative exposure




This was shot on manual 1/250 f5.6 and is too underexposed. So in this instance I am happy to use the camera's auto exposure.

Violet - I have clumps of these pretty flowers dotted around the garden. No idea what they are - probably turn out to be weeds! But they are a nice colour...




The camera's auto exposure gave a reading of 1/800 f7.1. I considered dropping the ISO, but as the projects are about the effect of exposure on colour, I went with it... The colour in this image is quite light, but I over exposed slightly to see what happened on the next one




Manual setting 1/800 f6.3. Still a definite colour, which surprised me as I thought it would be more bleached out, but obviously over-exposed




Manual 1/800 f8. Much truer to the colour and more detail in the petals as a result I think.




Manual 1/800 f9. Again slightly darker, as you would expect by under-exposing on the camera's auto exposure setting. I think this is the most accurate colour match to the flower.




Manual 1/800 f10. Too under-exposed.

Green - tulip leaf




Auto exposure 1/500 f6.3. This is quite an accurate representation of the leaf colour but I tried under-exposing again a couple of times




Manual 1/500 f7.1 and




Manual 1/500 f8. I think the slight under-exposure of the second shot gives the best and most accurate green. I need to refer to the colour wheel to see how accurately this and the violet match.

Blue - bluebells again. Initially I shot them from the front, but the colour of the bells is still too violet. But I noticed that the top of the bell was a definite blue, so I positioned myself behind the bluebells and shot from there.




Auto exposure of 1/500 f5.6. See what I mean about the top of the bell being blue even though the bell is violet? Never noticed that before. The blue is quite bleached out in this one so I under-exposed again




Manual 1/500 f6.3 and




Manual 1/500 f7.1. This is the one which I think gives the best blue, although it has more shadows. I think the overall impression of the shot is "blue"

So I need to look at putting together my new colour wheel to see where I now have gaps. Back shortly...

Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Green

I tried to photograph something to illustrate "green". In the garden at this time of year, pretty much everything is green - grass, leaves, buds - so I headed out into the garden thinking "easy". Actually, not so easy as it happens.

I think I have said before that in NZ the light quality was such that you could see "a million" shades of green in the trees. Well it turns out that you can see tens, maybe even hundreds of shades of green in foliage. So leaves have turned out to be not quite an ideal subject for this project!




This was the "out of the camera" shot of (I think) foxglove leaves, which came in at 1/100 sec f4. I thought the green was too light overall so shot again in manual mode.



1/100 sec f5.6. And this is undoubtedly too dark. But I do think that some of the "greens" represent the green I am after.

Because the subject has many leaves, at all different angles, shadows are being cast which are affecting the brightness of the image. I think if I continue with the idea of foliage and flowers, I need to use a macro lens to pick out a small area of the subject. Lighting, using natural light, should be easier on a small single surface too.

I'll have another go......

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad