Category Archives: Photography

From the Ministry of Odd Coincidences…

This evening I watched this week’s Horizon, which, by remarkable assonance with my blog, was on the topic of the perception of colour. The programme made it clear that colour perception varies widely and subject to personal and contextual forces. However, given my post this morning, I was most interested in the fact that colour perception is strongly linked to the vocabulary you have to describe colours and their differences. The Namibian tribe who have words to describe slightly different shades of green, but who lump blues and greens together under a single word, can see the former, but not a blue/green variation.

Now I’ve always had a very good physical ability to remember and match or discriminate colours, but when I first met my wife I couldn’t articulate this. To exploit my colour vision in conversations with her (such as answering “do you think this will match X?” :)) I learned a more powerful vocabulary, and in turn further developed my colour visualisation skills.

When I took up photography seriously a few years ago I became aware of the colour of light, but again really got on top if it when I learned appropriate vocabulary to describe lighting causes and effects.

So maybe my visualisation skills relate to my ability to describe (even internally) what I see or the resultant image I want. I can do this in colour because I have developed an effective colour vocabulary. I don’t “see” in monochrome because I don’t mentally describe scenes using monochrome terms, unless I’m forced to because it’s all shades of grey, or just a single colour.

The great photographers of the early twentieth century developed the vocabulary I need. Ansel Adams’ Zone System was designed for exactly this purpose, and in his writing, such as Examples he actively describes scenes using the zone terminology. I understand the theoretical concepts, but I haven’t developed the habit of using them as linguistic tools to describe a scene. Clearly I could train myself to do so, but I don’t want to lose my skill with colours as a result. The interesting challenge is whether I can become visually bilingual.

Location:Bookham Rd,,United Kingdom

Some experienced photographers, particularly those with a background in traditional film photography, claim to be able to “see” a scene in black and white, visualising how a monochrome version might work. This focuses on the tonality, and ignores the colours in the scene.

I’ve been trying to do this, with a little success, and I’m quite pleased with this scene I captured at Sissinghurst last weekend, where I managed to visualise in advance the effect of the statue against the hedge, and the shadow on the lawn.

But I’ve realised I can only do this where the scene is dominated by a single colour. In this case, it was all different shades and tones of green (or grey). As regular readers and friends will know, colour is very important to me, and when the colour palette is richer, I find it very difficult to ignore my interest in the colours and focus only on the tones.

I wonder whether the best black and white photographers are just less interested in colour in normal life, or whether they can switch their vision of the colour on and off, something I can’t do?

One of my birthday presents was a dance photography masterclass, hosted at the Victoria and Albert museum and led by renowned dance photographer Chris Nash. This was a bit of a departure for my photography, although followers of my blog may remember I captured a couple of satisfactory shots from late night entertainment on my Cuba trip.

The above is a montage of three shots taken trying to capture Soledad doing an impressive flying leap. It’s my homage to the work of Eadweard Muybridge. I think it works, although it has reminded me why I try and develop my images directly in the RAW processor, with as little messing around in PhotoShop as I can manage.

Thanks to the V&A for hosting an excellent event, to Chris and his team for leading a very inspiring and educational course, and to Soledad and her companions for working very hard, tirelessly and without complaint, and presenting us with some wonderful movements and shapes to work with.