Without Color

Recently a post on the importance of light and color in how people "see" was posted which generated a thought.  What becomes important in an image if color is removed.  To see what happens the image below was created of an early morning cloudscape over the Peloncillo mountains.  When the colors are converted to grayscale the result is an image where differences in texture and contrast seem to dominate.  Rather than the wavelength of reflected light being a dominate component of the photograph (a phenomena external to the camera's CMOS chip) it is the internal differences within the image itself that become important to me as a viewer.  Visually exploring the color original my eye first focuses on the blue sky and not the clouds, while in the black and white image my eye is drawn to the clouds and the differences in contrast then in texture.  So perhaps underlying the differences in color are the important differences in contrast and texture which helps make a photograph interesting to a viewer.

Original multi-image panorama in color as a starting point.

Final product, an early morning cloudscape in black and white

About Light and Color

Watching the landscape over time I have concluded it is all about light and color.  Light being the intensity and wavelengths of light from the sun filtered through the atmosphere that illuminates the landscape throughout the day and throughout the year, with or without clouds (creating shadows which add texture).  While color being the wavelengths of light reflected off the landscape as a result of the light.  While not a major revelation to most, the interaction of light and color is always producing something new to see which I find fascinating and struggle constantly with trying to create images that reflect what I see.

Since "seeing" is a combination of the biological components of vision and the processing of that information, it does not lend itself easily to study using a reductionist approach.  Rather I am forced to acknowledge that a holistic approach is required which incorporates both the biological aspects and information processing aspects of "seeing" when producing an image.  I conclude that the landscape views that I find so fascinating msut be the result of an emergent phenomena that results from the interplay of light and color interacting with visual processing creating something greater than the simple sum of its parts.

When addressing the information processing aspects of "seeing" I have no objective method for measuring what others see.  Instead I'm forced to post the image and measure others response to what was created.  While this semi-quantitative approach works it adds another whole layer of confounding variables.  The location where the image appears, the probability an image with show up in search engine rankings,  the biases associated with a specific audience that views the image, and the quality of the image reproduced on the viewers computer screen.  These additional variables impede the ability to understand how others "see" making it is difficult to tease out and concentrate on those aspects that would allow the creation of images with more universal appeal.

Below are 2 images both taken in the front garden of the Painted Pony Resort.  One is an evening view of the Yucca and Ocotillo taken with the long light of late afternoon.  While the second is an early morning view of a single Ocotillo stem starting to bloom.  These 2 images taken from essentially the same location (the single stem image is the Ocotillo on the left side of the first image) and at the same time of year demonstrate how differences in light and color affect the final image produced.  But in presenting these images (which I personally find appealing) I'm still no closer in understanding how people "see".

A view of the garden.

A single Ocotillo stem beginning to flower

Digital Photography Workshop Announcement

Flyer for digital photography workshop

Sew What Forum

Saturday, April 27th - 1:00 to 3:00 p.m. (AZ time)

Portal Rescue Classroom

Speaker: Bruce Thompson, Photographer

With the popularity of inexpensive digital cameras and the ability to easily capture images of the world around us, photography remains a popular activity.  But what makes an interesting photograph?  Professional photographers routinely make interesting and captivating images but this is not about professional photography it is about the rest of us who are exploring the world as we see it and capturing images that reflect our perception.

The goal of the workshop is to explore the idea of “how people see” from an individual and personal perspective.  While the biology of vision is the same in all humans, the neural processing of those images differs between people. In other words, what I like you may not like and vice versa, so what do people like?

The workshop will cover:

1.  Composition 

Location or viewpoint

Scale 

  Single images

The little picture and mid scale picture

The outside is just as important as the inside

The edges of your scene

Don’t just stick it in the middle

  Multi image panoramas

The big picture - How to digitally make a panorama

Drawing the viewer into your photograph

2.  Image processing (Photoshop is not a bad word)

Software

Photoshop

Gimp

Panorama software

Image processing

The color curve

Saturation

Levels and contrast

Depth

Desaturation (old school)

Tilt shift

3.  Online image storage

  Places to store and show off your work

Storage sites

How to get your work indexed on the web

Renaming files

Alt tags and descriptions

Participants should bring their personal digital camera, laptop/tablet/paper and pencil for notes and references.  We will make 3 images together from the Portal Rescue Station as demonstration pieces and I will show the processing steps discussed.

Bruce Thompson uses the online nom de plume of “BAlvarius” for his online photography and currently manages the Painted Pony Resort outside Rodeo NM.  A Biologist by training, molecular geneticist by trade, pilot by avocation, and estate manager by necessity he was a visitor to the Chiricahua Mountains starting in the late 1980’s.  Becoming a permanent resident at the end of 2006 specializing in low level aerial photography and videography, his photographic interests center on landscape photography.