Krause Color and Emphasis

Exercise 1

Warm Up

As a warm up exercise in class we were told to take one simple image and make several copies of it. I decided to use Adobe Photoshop for this warm up. I chose the image of the heel because it is simple and easy to lasso using the magnetic lasso tool. I then opened a new document and dragged several copies of the shoe into it.

Original Image

Draft 1

In my first draft I used five copies of the shoe. I placed them in a straight line. I then used the color overlay tool to place a black overlay over four of the shoes. This placed a greater emphasis on the remaining bright pink shoe.

Draft 2

In my second draft I decided to use the image adjustment tool. I used four shoes in a line this time. I selected one shoe and changed the adjustment to black and white. This created an emphasis on the one uncolored shoe. Although the remaining three shoes are bright pink and may usually catch the eye, now that the black and white shoe is the "odd one out" the eye is directed towards it. Finally, I used the rectangle too to add a finishing touch to the image. I made one rectangle a gray color and another a bright pink color.

I feel that my drafts both effectively show how color can be used to create emphasis. In both images one shoe differs from the rest, causing it to stand out from the others. Krause says "If everyone shouts, how will any one voice be heard?" (63). This is an interesting concept to keep in mind. It is important to make your work easy on the eyes by showing exactly what you what emphasized. Color helps you do this.

Exercise 2

Past and Present

For this exercise I chose an image of a street in Hong Kong. The assignment was to select one object in the scene and make it stand out from the rest of the photo. Below is my original image.

Original Image

My Final Product

First, I used the polygonal lasso tool to select the double decker trolley. I then inverted the selection and used the adjustment tool to make the rest of the image black and white.  Now, the double decker trolley is vibrantly in color, while the rest of the image is black and white. This exercise is called past and present because the black and white effect causes the image to look old, while the vibrant colored trolley looks very modern. I chose the trolley because it shows innovation and technology. I believe my image is a good representation of how black and white versus color can show emphasis and connect to larger themes such as changes through the times.