I’ve previously written an entire series about color in nature photography but this time I’m going to concentrate on using color to make your subject stand out. For the most part color in nature isn’t something we can control. As a photographer all you can do is observe it and capture it, which can make it both easier and more difficult as a tool to make your subject become singled out. If a great contrasting color is there all you have to do is point the camera and take the picture, but sometimes finding that perfect contrasting color can be more difficult and require re-thinking your angle and composition.
Flowers and plants can be a vast source or many different and vibrant colors. One advantage of photographing them is they don’t move. You can really take your time and look for the right colors or just the right composition to make a specific color stand out. In the first example below the green (which is one of the most common natural colors) really stands out because of the composition and utilizing a really dark background.
Another example of color that makes the subject stand out are birds. There are literally thousands of colors in the bird world and we as photographers can try to take advantage of that. The difficulty with bird photography is the inability to control what the subject does and where it goes. Most of the time luck plays a huge part in getting a beautifully colored bird on the perfect background. Other times it can be patience, waiting and waiting for a bird to show up in just the right spot to make it’s color stand out. I usually use a combination of the two. Since I become easily bored, luck plays a large part in my ability to capture the beautiful color of birds against contrasting backgrounds.
Colors can be used in all different types of nature photography, not just the examples I’ve shown and talked about. It can be more difficult and require some time and patience to pay off, but in my opinion it can be one of the most striking methods for making your subject “singled out”. Next week I’ll be talking about silhouettes and if you have time click below to view the rest of the series.
Pretty obvious here, the red really makes the flower become the main subject.
This photo of the Cardinal has the 3 primary colors going on but the one that really stands out is the bright red. It's the most intense color in the scene and just seems to catch your eye the most.
Again here the bright white of the Egret stands out in the field of green marsh grass.
Another example of the bright red really catching the viewer's eye and making the blossoms on the branch become the main subject of the photo. This also has a little depth of field helping to draw your eye to the center blossom.
Here we have a great landscape on it's own. The many islands off the coast of Bar Harbor Maine make for a great scenic photograph. Once you add the bright red sails on this boat all of a sudden you have a definitive subject in the photo.
This is a more subtle use of color but the blue of the Tri-Colored Heron contrasts nicely against all the green in the scene and allows the subject to stand out.
There's that bright red again doing it's thing. In my opinion this is one of the most stand out uses of color there is.
Wildlife Photography Blog