Colour experiments

Colour grading

Colour is a very important aspect of my video as it not only gives it a cinematic and visually interesting quality, but plays a role in the narrative.

The flashback sequences will almost always have some kind of raised saturation or effect put on it to emphasise the colours or to add a specific quality to the clip. The flashbacks are of a happier time full of positive emotions and memories, and this can be brought across by making the clips as bright and emotive as possible through the use of these colours. By doing this, the contrast with the present (which will have a washed-out, almost black and white look) will be particularly apparent and a visual and emotional comparison can be made.

To achieve this visual style, I used Adobe Premiere Pro and the three-way colour corrector effect which allows me to control the colour of the shadows, midtones, and highlights. For most of the clips, only the midtones and highlights will be changed.

Midtones 

In order to create a positive and vibrant atmosphere for these scenes, the midtones will be warm and more focused towards oranges/yellows/reds. This will enhance the natural (summer) light used in many of the locations as the picture below shows. Here I enhanced the oranges and yellows which gives the sunset a soft glow which reflects off of the sea and makes the whole background look extremely warm and happy. The black silhouette of the actors also stands out more as the contrast between black and yellow is stronger than that of black and blue.





Original clip                                                                                       Colour corrected





Highlights

Depending on the colour enhancing of the midtones, the highlights will either follow the same scheme to enhance it or be contrasting to add more visual interest. For the picture above, the highlights are in the same yellow/orange range as the midtones to further the warmth of the clip, however for other scenes that I will be editing, the midtones will be enhanced to exaggerate the red hues and I will therefore give the highlights a green/blue tint so that it stands out as these colours are opposite on the colour wheel. I feel that this will give the viewer a pleasing visual that will fit with my ideas of making the video very colourful as well as showing my understanding of how colours work with each other and influence emotion.