Colour vs black-and-white viewfinders
February 3rd 2012 08:03
Traditionally, viewfinders on cameras were black and white. Why? I don't know why, to be honest. Google it. Probably to do with limits of technology.
Even when colour viewfinders became possible, pro cameras had black-and-white, consumer cameras had colour. My guess is that either black-and-white viewfinders were still technically superior in terms of sharpness, or they were simply cheaper.
Anyways, I was first trained using just black and white, and it was a pain. Like when you first learn fencing, and have to get used to seeing through the mesh of the mask.
The main advantage of removing colour is that you can focus on other qualities of the image -- brightness, focus, textures of materials, composition, movement. It's easier to see when something is under or overexposed; and if you've memorised what the proper "zone" of black and white should look like for Caucasian skin, it's easier to adjust for that.
The big disadvantage, obviously, is that colour does matter. It matters slightly less for a controlled studio environment, where production values have been carefully thought about, shots have been designed, colour schemes have been planned. It matters more for the sort of run-and-gun stuff that I do, where you have to try to be sensitive to random combinations of colours that just seem to work.
(Why do they "just work"? Could be any number of reasons... For instance, sometimes there's fewer colours in the frame, so the image seems to convey this or that meaning. Or one particular colour jumps out. Or there's an interesting patterning of colours.)
Because colour does matter, I don't see anyone really going back to black-and-white... except for black-and-white films.
In the following vid (which is a couple of random clips I salvaged from a shoot I did, and randomly put together to Rammstein), there's a couple of places where I think being sensitive to colours made a difference in terms of composing the image.
Even when colour viewfinders became possible, pro cameras had black-and-white, consumer cameras had colour. My guess is that either black-and-white viewfinders were still technically superior in terms of sharpness, or they were simply cheaper.
Anyways, I was first trained using just black and white, and it was a pain. Like when you first learn fencing, and have to get used to seeing through the mesh of the mask.
The main advantage of removing colour is that you can focus on other qualities of the image -- brightness, focus, textures of materials, composition, movement. It's easier to see when something is under or overexposed; and if you've memorised what the proper "zone" of black and white should look like for Caucasian skin, it's easier to adjust for that.
The big disadvantage, obviously, is that colour does matter. It matters slightly less for a controlled studio environment, where production values have been carefully thought about, shots have been designed, colour schemes have been planned. It matters more for the sort of run-and-gun stuff that I do, where you have to try to be sensitive to random combinations of colours that just seem to work.
(Why do they "just work"? Could be any number of reasons... For instance, sometimes there's fewer colours in the frame, so the image seems to convey this or that meaning. Or one particular colour jumps out. Or there's an interesting patterning of colours.)
Because colour does matter, I don't see anyone really going back to black-and-white... except for black-and-white films.
In the following vid (which is a couple of random clips I salvaged from a shoot I did, and randomly put together to Rammstein), there's a couple of places where I think being sensitive to colours made a difference in terms of composing the image.
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