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December 2, 2008 |
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Created and Maintained by: The Photoimaging Information Council |
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by Chuck Place |
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A great blue heron glided into my image, landing right where I would have placed it—if I had a trained heron. Better lucky than good! I was photographing a book on San Diego, working with reflections of the ornate buildings in Balboa Park. Afternoon is not a particularly colorful time, but as the sun moved lower, the warm tones of the buildings were intensifying and I was photographing a reflection of the architecture in order to saturate the color of the scene even further. The golden reflection of the ornate Spanish Revival building was contrasting beautifully with the cool tones of the green lily pads and blue reflected sky, producing a unique image of Balboa Park.  If there is a trick to finding strong reflections, it is that the subject must be well lit while the reflecting surface must be shaded. Almost any shiny surface can be used to produce a colorful reflection, including store windows and car hoods. My favorite, however, remains still water. For me, nothing conveys the serenity of my hometown like the morning reflection of fishing boats in the calm water of our harbor.
There are numerous tricks to producing colorful work during the day, when color is not so apparent, and utilizing reflections is one of those techniques. Backlighting is another. Mid day often results in washed out, high contrast lighting. If I am photographing a Mexican mercado or a farmer’s market here in the U.S., I often backlight the entire scene in order to control contrast and, equally important, to emphasize the colorful products. Everything on the shadow side in the composition is the same exposure, leveling out contrast, and light passing through flowers or leaves is always more colorful than if it is reflected off the same subject.   When visiting a new town or village, I often spend a morning wandering through the outdoor market, looking for colorful subjects and the interplay between vendors and customers. In almost all cases, if it is a sunny day, I will backlight many of my subjects. Skin tones are smoothed while colors become much more saturated. It’s an easy cure for a situation that often has too much contrast and too little color. This technique also works well with architecture. The Victorian buildings of Cape May, New Jersey, provide a fascinating range of colorful subjects. The many bed and breakfasts are painted in a rainbow of hues, making them easy to photograph early and late in the day. If you want good color and manageable contrast in the middle of the day, however, backlighting your subject is the best solution.  This technique was critical during an assignment in Cape May for the Tamron lens company. I had only three days to show the versatility of a new zoom lens and had no choice but to shoot all day long. The Mainstay Inn, one of Cape May’s most elegant B&Bs, can be a nightmare to shoot in full sun. Its intricate Victorian details made contrast a real issue, but backlighting the building and its surrounding sycamore trees caused everything to fall into place. The delicate woodwork was beautifully edge lit, the building and tree trunks were properly exposed and light passing through the fall leaves glowed with a golden light. During this assignment, I also made use of one of my other favorite sources of color—details. No matter what the lighting on a particular day, I can always find well-lit and colorful details to photograph. In the case of Cape May, brightly painted roof peaks and stair railings with flowers offered images that were not only vibrant, but also defined the exuberance of these “painted ladies”.   The colonial towns of Mexico are some of my favorite locations for details. The mid-day sun is very strong and, like the locals, I try to avoid it. That doesn’t mean I have to stop shooting, however. Many buildings have unique architectural details, while shops and galleries often display their wares outside in the shade. Sometimes the image is perfect just the way I find it and sometimes I have to move things around for a better composition. Maybe a potted plant is in the wrong location or some carved animals need to be grouped together. I always ask permission first before I touch anything and have rarely been turned down. For me, these intimate details often say more about the culture of an area than more general shots and they always add a spot of strong color during a drab part of the day.   Colorful images can be easy to produce at the beginning and end of the day, when warm light is prevalent. Creating vivid photographs during the rest of the day is definitely more challenging. Developing your ability to find hidden color not only broadens your coverage of a subject, it also helps you see what others miss. And seeing the world with greater clarity is, after all, one of the main reasons we all create photographs. 
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