Colours: Colour relationships - part 2

For the second location, I spent a few hours at Chichester Harbour in the early evening a few days ago. I was hoping that to find brightly coloured boats, or other subjects in the blue -orange and violet-yellow colour combinations.

Image 1: Dinghy and lifebuoy

Nikon 18-70mm at 70mm: Iso 200 f8 for 1/320th

This blue painted dinghy was on the quayside at Bosham next to a bright orange lifebuoy. I tried photographs from various angles, but preferred this view with the harbour in the background. This angle however reduced the size of the orange relative to the blue of the hull (and other blues in the background).

Comments on colours

To my eye, the hull colour is a moderately saturated medium blue. The lifebuoy on the other hand is more saturated but of similar brightness. I was pleased to find that colour checker figures given in Photoshop corresponded to this. Both blue and orange were about 70-80% brightness on the brightest surfaces, but the orange was far more saturated (71%) than the blue (39%).

Both the blue and the orange are reasonably pure hues and the contrast between the colours certainly makes the photograph stand out in an array of pictures. The surroundings of the main objects tones in well with the two colours: The stones in the foreground are cream coloured which coordinates reasonably well with the orange lifebuoy. The light blue seawater and sky in the background tones in well with the blue hull of the dinghy.

The ratio of orange to blue is, I would say, about 1:4 in this picture rather than 1:2, which is suggested in the notes as the most harmonious. I framed another photograph to produce a composition closer to a 1:2 proportion.

Image 1A: Dinghy and lifebuoy (Orange: blue ration about 1:2)

The contrast of the colours is stronger in this photograph, but from other respects (foreground, background etc), this version is less interesting visually.

Image 2: Deck of sailing barge

Nikon 18-70mm at 70mm: Iso 200 f8 for 1/160th

A sailing barge was moored at the quayside at Bosham, which had the topsides of the hull painted blue whereas the cabin walls were stained pale yellow in a light oak or pine colour.

Comments on colours

At the time, I thought that the wood stain might be close to a light orange, but on looking at this photograph subsequently, I decided that it is more of a subdued yellow. The colour combination in this picture is therefore closer to blue-yellow than blue-orange. I again cross checked the HSB parameters in Photoshop Elements. Both colours have similar saturation (60%), but the yellow wood stain is significantly brighter (53%) than the blue paint on the hull (34%) on the surfaces facing the lens.

I find the colours of the photograph quite harmonious even though the areas of blue and yellow are quite similar. This could be accounted for by the relative lightness of the yellow relative to the mid-blue of the hull.

After looking at the blue and orange picture, the blue and yellow combination seems to lack sparkle.

Image 3: Hanging basket

Nikon 18-70mm at 65mm: Iso 200 f6.3 for 1/60th

I saw this hanging basket outside a cottage in Bosham village where the gardner had chosen a combination of yellow and purple blooms. Whilst this is one of the colour combinations I was looking for, it was unfortunately not readily possible to take a photograph with the proportion of yellow only about one third of the proportion of purple/violet. I nevertheless thought I would include this photograph in my notes in case I do not find another subject with this combination.

Comments on colours

Both the yellow and the purple/violet colours are saturated and bright. The main colour is pure yellow even though there are parts of the yellow petals that are slightly orangy and in the shadows, the yellow petals have a blue-green tinge. The purple flowers are dark purply-blue at the base of the petals changing to a brighter blue or violet towards the edges of the petals.

The juxtaposition of saturated yellow and purple-violet in this photograph seems to bring out the vibrancy of both colours, and the green background does not appear to subdue the impact.

Conclusion

Many years ago, I read an article in a photography magazine on photographing yellow subjects. I remembered that this suggested placing yellow with blue and I had looked for this combination on a number of occasions in the past. That article probably recommended looking for yellow with purple as well, but this had slipped from my memory until reviewing these photographs.

Whilst I still find a blue and yellow combination is sometimes quite striking, it seems clear from this exercise that blue with orange and yellow with violet are more vibrant colour combinations.