I know that you were suspecting that today's post is going to be about photo styling but before we do that let's focus on colours and why understanding the colours can make the photo styling easier. It's a really easy topic and it can help speed up the process of figuring out the concept of the photo and finding ideal decorations for each concept.
Harmony and disharmony
When I started a music school I had to learn the theory of the music which helped me later during many important exams - there are some sounds which mixed together doesn't sound good to our ears - we call that disharmony and I will use that term in a photography context too because. Disharmony can be seen not only in such a big mess on a photo but for me it's mostly visible in colours - sometimes it's good to risk but sometimes it's better to keep this game safe. There are colours that work well together and colours which can work but not really like orange and pink - it can be risky but for example purple and brown? I do not see it going well in a photo but it's more complicated - it's all about shades and saturation.
Colour wheel & colour palette
I believe that no matter if you take a flatlay for your beauty blog or a portrait, it's good to focus on a concept first. Focusing on colour helped me a lot that's why sometimes I still try to make something that we call "mood board" before taking a photo. I use this technique when I need to design a project at any of my studies - it's useful in landscape architecture and programming so why can't I just use it anywhere else? It's especially helpful if you can't imagine two or more things such as colours, textures and elements working together which is quite normal in my opinion - sometimes you just need some creativity exercises to start having great ideas and sometimes you need some motivation. Instagram and Pinterest are great places where you can find some motivation, I also encourage you to take part in some photo challenges like I'm going to do next week - I was thinking that I might not be able to do the whole week to keep mixing the topic of the challenges with a concept of my beauty/skincare account. I encourage you to take part in the challenge too - I'll tell more about it later but let's go back to the main point.
The key to success is a balance - no matter if it's skincare or photography, the balance between elements and colours can help you a lot. Try to limit selected colours to 5 shades at most - obviously, your photo will have more shades because of some details but the main topic should have 5 shades at most and that's our base. The easiest way to build a colour concept is by using complementary colours or by using contrast. It's a good moment to review some basic knowledge from school - colour wheel. To be honest I use colour wheels only if I need it for a graphic work but I know that for many of you it might be really helpful. Adobe Color CC is an online tool where you can choose colours by different colour rules like monochrome, triade, etc.
Monochrome
Sometimes the key to success is focusing on one element or colour. I talk a lot about Instagram in this series because even if I know sites related to photography and art quite well the aesthetic on Instagram is the most noticeable - users focus on theme and aesthetic a lot. Choosing the main colour can help you set an 'aesthetic' goal, for example, check Mabel's account - the two colours that are most visible for me - especially in her latest photos are purple and blue, all the shades are working perfectly together. Look at Ana's account now - the theme is very simple but you can see that it's her signature look. Sonia's account also focuses on the colour - no matter what background she chooses, all the shades are working together. If you plan to upload your photos to the Instagram if you plan to make a concept for a series of photos then choosing a topic, colour or texture might be an answer.
Colours and emotions
Do you know that each colour is related to different emotion? Depending on what we want to show in a photo choosing a specific tone during the editing or while taking the photo can make lots of difference. I've been editing some photos that from seeing all the elements you can see it's all about winter but during the editing, I saw one thing - using orange & teal preset I can make it look more cosy and warm while using a contrast preset without changing the temperature of the photo or tint - I barely ever do that, unless I take photos in different lighting than daylight - the photo looks raw and cold, like a very snowy winter but somehow romantic - it reminds me a little bit Neutrogena's commercials when they show us the amazing landscapes of Norway which are also raw and cold, the temperature of this commercial isn't warm and the first thing what I think when I see such commercial is "damn, she really has dry skin because of the weather there". So sometimes temperature of the photo and colours used in it can change the response to your photo drastically.
The psychology of colour
Colour psychology is a large topic and it's really useful in marketing these days. I just want you to be aware that sometimes choosing the wrong colour as a theme can be a really bad decision. Try to google "Why is Facebook blue?", I'm sure you'll find lots of articles based on researches related to colour psychology. Just to mention - same works for Instagram, there were some studies which prove that the photos with blue tones are more popular.
The skin
If you take photos of people or a selfie try to focus on skin tone - wrong editing or settings on your camera can make the skin looks unnatural or even make you sick - that's usually my problem, I usually end up with yellowish skin tone but hopefully editing helps a lot. I barely edit the skin because I do not take portraits regularly - I just do that once/twice a year but knowing the undertones helps a lot.
Just to remind you people with cool tones have blue or purple undertones, people with warm tones have green undertones while people with neutral tones have a mix of blue and green tones. Obviously, it's not that simple because sometimes it's good to mess up the colours if it's the look we need but for an everyday photo like your Facebook photo or LinkedIn photo - just don't make your skin look yellow or green.
Photo challenge
I've decided to take part in a photo challenge which was made by Agwer - a very talented Polish makeup artist and blogger - I also want to say Instagrammer/photographer - her photos are well planned. The challenge is starting on November 20th, each day I'll upload a new photo on Instagram related to this challenge with a hashtag #fotowyzwanieagwer. All the information you can find on Agwer's blog, unfortunately, it's in Polish and google translate might have problems with translating it correctly, but here are the dates and topics just to let you know the concept of the photos if you want to take part in it or if you just want to know what's going on with the photos. I might later tell more about it in one of the future posts because it connects strongly with one and probably the best tip I'll share with you.
Monday: 20.11 - Dzień dobry (Good Morning)
Tuesday: 21.11 - Uśmiechnij się (Smile)
Wednesday 22.11 - Mamy jesień (We've got an autumn)
Thursday 23.11 - Niezbędnik (Toolkit)
Friday 24.11 - Rozejrzyj się (Look around)
Saturday 25.11 - Ja (I)
Sunday 26.11 - Coraz bliżej święta (Christmas is coming)
Let me know if you take part in the challenge and I hope you'll support me in this challenge too :)
Do you focus on colours while taking your photos? What topic should we focus together next time?
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