The Use of Colour in Cinematography: Storytelling & Genre

7/17/2019 The Use of Colour in Cinematography: Storytelling & Genre

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/the-use-of-colour-in-cinematography-storytelling-genre 1/74

1

The Use of Colour inCinematography:

Storytelling and Genre

Anthony Wells -17176- August 2015

SAE Institute Oxford – Dissertation Word Count – 9,915 (main body)



i

Abstract

Colour has always been an intriguing aspect of cinematography. For this dissertation I

have chosen to focus on its role in aiding storytelling and genre depiction. Colour is a

part of everyday life and it impinges upon almost every facet of our lives, influencing us – whether emotionally, physically or intellectually – in any number of different and

unpredictable ways.

Three attributes, physical, physiological and psychological play an important role in the

perception of and response to colour. The use of colour within films has evolved through

artistic vision and technical innovation. Technicolor dominated the industry for nearly

three decades. Their leading colour consultant, Natalie Kalmus, had a distinct style and

a particular idea of what colour on the screen should look like: Some believe she played

a major role in the development of colour palettes to aid storytelling.

However, when first used colour was considered a diversion and reserved almost

exclusively for some musicals and fantasy films. The ‘Elements of Color in Professional

Motion Pictures’ (1957) – produced by the Society of Motion Pictures and Television

Engineers stipulated that colour should be subordinate to the narrative and, in no

circumstances, constitute ‘a separate entity to compete with or detract from the

dramatic content of the picture’. Despite the conservative tone of manuals and

guidelines on the use of colour a few directors experimented.

Today the use of colour in cinematography is considered a vital part of creating a movie.

Colour can communicate time and place, define characters, and establish emotion, mood,

atmosphere, and a psychological sensibility. A single consistent colour in a story can be

used to depict associations whereas; a change in colour shows transition. Due to the

importance of being able to discern between genres and the visual cues in form of genre

specific colour grading, standardised colour palettes for different genres have appeared

and are almost expected. To fulfil the practical element of this dissertation I have filmed

short clips and exposed them to colour correction templates to demonstrate how specific

genres can be produced with little more than a laptop with a discussion on what this

means for colour in the film industry.



ii

Table of Contents Abstract ............................................................................................................................... i

List of Figures .................................................................................................................. iv

List of Tables .................................................................................................................... vi

Introduction ...................................................................................................................... 1

What is Colour? ................................................................................................................ 1

Physical Properties of Colour ....................................................................................... 2

What is light? ................................................................................................................... 3

Physiological Mechanism: How the Eye Sees Colour ............................................... 5

Structure of the human eye .......................................................................................... 5

Psychological Processes ................................................................................................. 6

How do we Perceive colour? ......................................................................................... 7

Effects of Colour on Emotion ........................................................................................ 8

History of Colour in Cinema ............................................................................................. 10

Late 1800’s to Early 1900’s ............................................................................................ 10

1920s-1950’s ................................................................................................................... 12

Technicolor .................................................................................................................. 13

Modern Day and Digital ................................................................................................ 17

The Role of Colour in Film ........................................................................................... 20 Early thoughts on the use of colour in film ................................................................... 20

Expanding the Use of Colour in Film ............................................................................ 21

The Use of Colour to Aid Storytelling ........................................................................ 25

Associative Colours in Storytelling ............................................................................ 25

Transitional Colours in Storytelling .......................................................................... 27

General Use of Colour for Audience Benefit ................................................................. 30

The Use of Colour in Genre Distinction .................................................................... 33

What is Genre? ............................................................................................................... 33

Genre Specific Colour Grading ...................................................................................... 33

Horror ......................................................................................................................... 34

Romance/Comedy ....................................................................................................... 37

Post-apocalyptic / War ................................................................................................ 38

Science Fiction ............................................................................................................ 41

Western ....................................................................................................................... 42

Action, Drama and Thriller ........................................................................................ 44



iii

Criticisms of Genre specific Colouration ....................................................................... 45

Practical Application of Genre Specific Colour ...................................................... 49

Methodology ................................................................................................................... 50

Results ............................................................................................................................ 50

Conclusion ....................................................................................................................... 52

Bibliography ................................................................................................................... 54

Webography .................................................................................................................... 58

Filmography .................................................................................................................... 64

A PPENDIX I ........................................................................................................................ 66



iv

List of Figures

Figure 1 – Three factors which can affect colour perception ............................................ 2

Figure 2 – The wavelength (nm) for different visible colours ............................................ 3

Figure 3 – How the reflection/absorption of light alters the appearance of an object...... 3 Figure 4 – Isaac Newton’s Colour Wheel........................................................................... 4

Figure 5 – Diagram of the human eye and its main components. .................................... 6

Figure 6 – Lightsabers from Star Wars 1977. ................................................................... 8

Figure 7 – Hand coloured film - The Infernal Cauldron 1903. ....................................... 11

Figure 8 - Flowers and Trees 1932. ................................................................................. 12

Figure 9 – On With the Show 1929. ................................................................................. 13

Figure 10 – Gold Diggers of Broadway 1929 ................................................................... 13

Figure 11 – Example of Natalie Kalmus colour palette from It’s a Pleasure 1945. ....... 15

Figure 12 – The Adventures of Robin Hood 1938. ........................................................... 15

Figure 13 – The Wizard of Oz 1939 ................................................................................. 16

Figure 14 – Gone with the Wind 1939. ............................................................................ 16

Figure 15 - Up, 2009 ....................................................................................................... 17

Figure 16 – Subdued palette used in True Grit 2010...................................................... 18

Figure 17 – Isolated colour (red) used to add contrast in Sin City 2005 ........................ 18

Figure 18 – Screen shot demonstrates the red and green used throughout Amélie ...... 19 Figure 19 – Subtle colours depict reality in Slumdog Millionaire 2008 ......................... 19

Figure 20 – A more realistic colour palette in Apocalypse Now 1979 ............................. 19

Figure 21 – Image showing sallow yellow-green colouration in Seven 1995 .................. 22

Figure 22 – Contract between blue and gold in Eyes Wide Shut 1999 ........................... 22

Figure 23 – Surreal colouring used in The Cook, the Thief, His Wife & Her Lover. ....... 23

Figure 24 – The use of red throughout Raise The Red Lantern 1991 ............................. 23

Figure 25 – The colour red appears regularly in We Need to Talk About Kevin 2011 .... 26

Figure 26 – The use of orange throughout The Godfather 1972 ..................................... 26

Figure 27 – The use of three colours to depict different areas in Traffic 2000 .............. 27

Figure 28 – Green associated with Madeline in Vertigo 1958 ........................................ 27

Figure 29 – Images showing the colour transition throughout The Last Emperor 1987 28

Figure 30 – Colour Wheel ................................................................................................ 29

Figure 31 – Walter revealing a deeper shade of red below his shirt in Breaking Bad .. 29

Figure 32 - The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari 1920. ................................................................. 30

Figure 33 – The Wizard of Oz 1938 ................................................................................. 31 Figure 34 – Paranormal Activity 2007 ........................................................................... 35



v

Figure 35 – A Nightmare on Elm Street 1984 ................................................................ 35

Figure 36 – Saw 2004 ..................................................................................................... 36

Figure 37 – Poltergeist 2015 .......................................................................................... 36

Figure 38 – The Cabin in the Woods 2012....................................................................... 36

Figure 39 – Amélie 2001. ................................................................................................. 37

Figure 40 – Titanic 1997 .................................................................................................. 37

Figure 41 – Love Actually 2003. ...................................................................................... 38

Figure 42 – Book of Eli 2010. ........................................................................................... 38

Figure 43 – Children of Men 2006. .................................................................................. 39

Figure 44 – Death Race 2008 ........................................................................................... 39

Figure 45 – Terminator: Salvation 2009. ........................................................................ 39

Figure 46 – The Road 2009. ............................................................................................. 40

Figure 47 – American Sniper 2014. ................................................................................. 40

Figure 48 – Saving Private Ryan 1998. ........................................................................... 40

Figure 49 – The Matrix 1999 ........................................................................................... 41

Figure 50 – Fight Club 1999. ........................................................................................... 41

Figure 51 – Blade Runner 1982 ....................................................................................... 42

Figure 52 – Tron: Legacy 2010 ........................................................................................ 42

Figure 53 – Once Upon a Time in the West 1968. ........................................................... 43

Figure 54 – The Quick and the Dead 1998. ..................................................................... 43

Figure 55 – Django Unchained 2012 ............................................................................... 43

Figure 56 - Die Hard 5 2013 ........................................................................................... 44

Figure 57 – The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 2 2008. .......................................... 44

Figure 58 – The Fighter 2010. ......................................................................................... 45

Figure 59 – Image showing retrograde colouring in O’ Brother Where Art Thou 2000 .. 45

Figure 60 – Orange & Blue Movie Posters ...................................................................... 46

Figure 61 – Drive 2011..................................................................................................... 46

Figure 62 – GI Joe Retaliation 2013. ............................................................................... 47

Figure 63 – Battleship 2012 ............................................................................................. 47

Figure 64 – Transformers 2007 ....................................................................................... 47

Figure 66 – The overuse of green altered the appearance Black Hawk Down 2001 ...... 48

Figure 67 – Screenshot of Red Giant – Magic Bullet Looks 3. ....................................... 49

Figure 68 – Closer view of the preset options in Red Giant ........................................... 49



vi

List of Tables

Table 1 - Results from the practical element of the project, showing screen shots from

the three clips subjected to colour correction .................................................................... 51

Table 2 - Major changes and theories that contributed to modern colour correctiontechniques .......................................................................................................................... 52



vii

“ Colour, as we all know, is one of the most important features of

cinema. Apart from the invention of sound in cinema colour is

another factor that is significant to add to the aesthetics of a film.

Colour holds a powerful position among the elements of film

structure as it speaks a universal language (quite like music).

Colour can be utilitarian and aesthetic, vivifies mood, delineates

characters, and enhances the meaning of a scene.”

Pamela Cook 1999



1

The Use of Colour inCinematography: Storytelling

and Genre Introduction

Colour is an extremely hard concept to describe without seeing it. If someone were to

ask you ‘What is colour?’ What would you say? How would you explain what magenta

looks like or how turquoise feels? One way of describing colour is:

“ It’s our psychological reaction to different wavelengths of visible light; it’s how we

visually perceive our reality” (Criswell, 2015).

But a descriptive answer is very difficult to give. Colour and its role in storytelling has

always been an intriguing aspect of cinematography. There are numerous aspects,

relating to the effect colour has on a films aesthetic, that I could have researched for my

dissertation; but I have chosen to focus on its role in aiding storytelling and genre

depiction. This project will give a brief overview of colour and its qualities, both physical

and psychological; it will then consider how the film industry has applied these differentaspects over the last century. I then look at how the introduction of colour grading

techniques have allowed the manipulation of colour in film and the role it plays with

regards to story and genre. The practical element of the dissertation will be achieved

through the production of short film clips that are colour graded according to the rules

depicted within the literature review; thus demonstrating the principles behind the use

of colour in film.

What is Colour?

Colour is a part of everyday life, we are surrounded by colour, and it impinges upon

almost every facet of our lives, influencing us – whether emotionally, physically or

intellectually – in any number of different and unpredictable ways (Byrne and Hilbert

1997; Everett, 2007). Consequently, humans have evolved with a certain understanding

of colour, partly because the survival of our ancestors depended on it with regard to

what to consume and avoid: for example the colour of berries (Ambroseand Harris, 2005;

Mather, 2006; Fagerholm, 2009).



2

There are three main processes that contribute to how we see and perceive colour, as

shown in Figure 1.

Figure 1 – Three factors which can affect colour perception (Yurek, 2013)

Each of the three attributes, Physical, Physiological and Psychological plays an

important role in the perception of and response to colour within film. These three areas

are discussed in more detail in the following sections.

Physical Properties of ColourThe study of colour from the view of a physicist is one of refracting and reflecting light

components and how these are interpreted by the human eye. This concept was first

theorised in 1666. At this time a young Isaac Newton, experimenting with optics,

concluded that colour is a property intrinsic to light (Whittaker, 1910), which in turn

can stimulate the eye and evoke a visual sensation (Mather, 2006).

The next section looks at what light is and how it contributes to our visualisation of

colour.



3

What is light?

Light is a form of radiant energy made up of varying wavelengths (Figure 2).

Figure 2 –The wavelength (nm) for different visible colours (Source: Barolet 2008)

These different wavelengths result in objects being seen as different colours, dependent

on which colours of the spectrum they absorb and reflect (as shown in Figure 3). A red

object, for instance, reflects the red light on the spectrum and absorbs most of the other

colours (Mather, 2006).

Figure 3 – How the reflection/absorption of light alters the appearance of an object (Source:

Darling, 1991)

Newton (1706) was the first in establishing a colour wheel and describing a

prismatic spectrum of seven colours linked in a circular arrangement, as he did notconsider any one colour to be more important than the others. The colours are listed

below along with a diagram showing the circle designed by Newton (Figure 4).

Red,

Violet

Indigo

Blue

Green

Yellow

Orange



4

Figure 4 – Isaac Newton’s Colour Wheel (Gunadjaja, 2012)

This circular arrangement has remained standard in the colour theory until today,

despite other colour order systems of Ostwald and Munsell. However, it is now

understood that there are three primary colours (red, blue, green), mixtures of these

primary colours can produce all the other colours in the spectrum, and when added

together, they produce white. Conversely, when any one of the three primaries is

subtracted from white, the result is a light composed of the other two. Colour can thus

be produced by the subtraction as well as the addition of the three primary components

of white light (Moser, 2003; Aslam, 2006).

Whilst wavelength is a primary factor in the colour that is seen by the human eye, it is

also argued that the interaction of their three basic attributes (hue, intensity and

saturation) that produces various colours and play a far more important role in colour

perception (Crozier 1996; Hupka et al,. 1997; Aslam, 2006).



5

Physiological Mechanism: How the Eye Sees Colour

Despite the fact that light bouncing off objects and being either reflected or absorbed,

provides the physical foundation of colour perception, there must also be an instrument

to receive and aid the translation of this information.

The human eye is much like a camera. It has a lens, a light-sensitive layer called a

retina, and an eyelid that acts as a shutter. Although we don't know everything about

how the eye sees colour, we do know that human vision relates to three colours:

Research indicates that the brain translates wavelengths of light into colour sensation

through the use of nerve connections and of the brain (Kodak, 2007).

Structure of the human eye

Humans have a pair of roughly spherical single chambered, light-tight eyes; the inside

surfaces of which are lined with a layer of photoreceptors. The eyes function is to catch

light and direct it onto photoreceptors to allow the brain to process the information

(Mather, 2006).

Incoming light first passes through the cornea (see Figure 5), and then enters an

aperture known as the pupil which funnels the light into the lens. Light is focused by

the lens onto the retina where it stimulates the photoreceptors (rods and cones) thatrespond to different bands of wavelength. The retina of each eye contains over 100

million photoreceptor cells, responsible for converting light energy into neural activity.

Visual information is then transmitted to the brain via the optic nerve (Riley, 1995;

Everett, 2007).



6

Figure 5 – Diagram of the human eye and its main components (Fuensanta and Doble, 2012).

Whilst the eye is responsible for effectively gathering the light and converting it into

electrical impulses, it does not determine how we perceive colour. That is done

neurologically in the brain and is where perception of a colour starts to have greatest

meaning.

Psychological Processes

Colours play an important role in affecting our perceptions. They form an omnipresent

part of our daily lives, influencing our interactions with other individuals and with

inanimate objects (Bagchi and Cheema, 2013). Above we have mentioned the mechanical

side to colour vision and the physiology of the human eye that allow colour to be

processed within the brain. However, seeing colour is just the first step in a multitude ofprocesses that allow us to interpret the meaning and context of colours we see in

everyday life. In fact, the physical world has no colours. There are only light waves of

different wavelengths. It is left to the retinal cones of the human eye (shown in Figure 5)

to distinguish among such bands of light and make this world a rainbow for us (Madden

et al., 2000).

So is colour created in the brain to act as a perceptual tool for our visual-cognitive and -

affective functions? In 1623, Galileo remarked that colour represented secondary

qualities of matter that were perceiver-dependent, dispositional, laid in the minds of the



7

observers and were not really a property of the object (Galileo, 1989; Aslam, 2006),

initiating the debate on the psychological effects of colour and its relation with emotions.

Whilst this project cannot delve into the debate on psychological impact of colour it can

give a brief overview of how the perception of colour may be used to enhance a viewer’s

experience of a film.

How do we Perceive colour?

If thinking about colour purely in terms of the biological processes, it is very basically,

the mental or psychological result of the physical action of different light waves on our

eyes and optical nervous system (Neale 1985). When we perceive an object as being of a

particular colour, this perception is the result of two distinct processes.

1. The biological response - modification of light by the object itself, which, in

accordance with its own physical properties, will reflect some elements of the

spectrum of light that strikes it and absorbs others (Neale, 1985; Berens, 2014).

2. Colour memories - The physical and psychological (learned and cultural)

characteristics of the perceiving subject and its optical apparatus (Neale 1985;

Berens, 2014).

Kosslyn and Thompson (2003) have argued that as well as the two above-mentioned

processes, visual imagery and perception arises from activity in the brain. This neural

activity combined with long-term memory stores can generate images based on prior

knowledge, social learning and associations (Aslam, 2006). Hence a person’s

psychological experiences and processes have a role to play in their perception of colour.

It’s how we know just by the colour of the Lightsabers in Star Wars (1977), who’s good

and who’s evil (Figure 6).



8

Figure 6 – Lightsabers from Star Wars 1977 (Source: Jeffryn, 2009).

Knowing that colour perception is a psychological process and that applying it can

create certain atmospheres: creating a scheme around that colour can then emphasise

that atmosphere (Creswell 2015).

The usual reaction of a colour upon a normal person has been determined that they fall

into two groups; warm and cool.

Warm/Advanced: Red, orange and yellow and can be associated with sensationsof excitement, activity and heat.

Cool/Retiring: Green, blue and violet and can be associated with rest, coolness

and ease (Vacche and Price, 2006).

The psychological response of an audience to a particular colour can then in turn have

an effect on the emotion they feel when watching a film or scene. According to Bordwell

and Thompson (1990), the essential features which contribute towards the enjoyment of

a film are the emotional responses of the audience towards the image they are

confronted with, their subjective evaluation of its aesthetic characteristics, and their

recognition of the meaning that the relevant film carries (Maszerowska, 2012). Some of

these ideas are discussed in the following section.

Effects of Colour on Emotion

Colours can covey and have an effect on emotions in a very subtle way, but also in an

uncontrolled or significant manner. Colours are undoubtedly an important aesthetic

component in any artistic creation (Magrin-Chagnolleau, 2013). Hemphill (1996) shows



9

that brighter colours (e.g., white, pink, red, blue) elicit more positive reactions (e.g.,

happy, excited) than do darker colours (e.g., brown, black). Red induces aggression and

excitation, while green induces withdrawal, and black, anxiety (Bagchi and Cheema,

2013).

Much of the emotional impact of colour results from its multiple and rich associations,

but since such associations vary according to historical period, cultural contexts, and

individual experiences, yet again no definite emotional categories can be established

(Riley 1995; Everett, 2007). One of the reasons that colour can have such an impact on

emotion is it is often associated with memories. Henry et al., (2008) explain that we

have three types of colour memory: two types of long-term recall and one type of short-

term storage:

“Long-term colour memory seems to have a cognitive component in

terms of users’ preferred colours and is also influenced by an individual’s

precision of matching.”

The colours people tend to remember and perceive are often very common amongst

groups and there are expectations of what commonly perceived colours should look like.

However, Hurkman (2011) points out that memory colours are not the same colours we

see in reality and are more saturated than “actual measured saturation of the original

subjects” (Berens, 2014). In 1946, Bodrogi and Tarczali presented their results of an

Investigation of Human Colour Memory. This showed that a brick appeared to be

remembered as redder than the object, sand as more yellow, grass as greener, dry grass

as more yellow and pine trees as greener (Hurkman, 2011). This raises the question; if

what we expect to see is different from reality, should cinematographers and colourists

aim to reproduce these memory colours? Boust et al. (2004) have shown that viewers

prefer images that use memory colours over those that use original colours (Berens,2014). This is probably due to the fact that these memory based colours hold a more

personal emotional response that the ‘real’ colours.

So if colour can affect us in such an intrinsic and emotional level, surely it can be used to

add improved visual context to the image (Marshall, 2015). Since the days of black and

white film, before we could even place sound into films, we’ve been obsessed with the use

of colour and how it can change the emotion of a film. The expressive use of colour in

film has evolved through artistic vision and technical innovation – from hand tinting to

Technicolor experiments to faster stocks and digital processing. In the following



10

sections I consider some of the key aspects in the history of cinema that led to the

technological advances we see in colour today.

History of Colour in Cinema

Film has always been about the visual and the primordial age of cinema displays the

lengths people were willing to go too just to capture its essence. Before filters, colour

film and cameras existed, innovators like Thomas Edison and George Méliès would hand

tint their films (Yumibe, 2013). They would literally paint onto their film stock to

enhance their images (the earliest form of colour correction), so they could become all

the more wondrous. Colour was initially used to show the dreamlike quality of cinema

and the fictional visual medium was considered the pinnacle of escapism (Criswell,

2015).

Colour correction is a process where the colour of the original negative or master video

tape can be corrected for hue, tone, intensity, and value to achieve the original intent of

the director of photography, or altered to achieve special, specific colour effects that

create, mood, and atmosphere. Historically, colour correction was done at a film

laboratory where a colour timer would time each individual shot and correct flesh tones

and the overall colour feel, be it warm or cool. A new film print was then struck from the

negative using the corrections. As the medium developed film negatives could be

transferred to video and the colour correction done on a video console that provided more

opportunities in altering the colours on film. Now, digital tools are revolutionising colour

correction. Many non-linear editing platforms, such as Final Cut Pro and Avid, provide

the ability to correct and alter the colour of images digitally. Sophisticated digital colour

correction consoles allow the moviemaker to make major changes to the colour palette of

projects shot originally on film or video. This role of colour correction has gone from a

generalised application, to the ability to literally paint the image at will (LoBrutto,

2012).

Late 1800’s to Early 1900’s

Colour has been a common element of cinema from the very beginning, starting with

hand colouring of black-and-white film stock in the 1890s, a technique originally derived

from colouring magic lantern slides. One example of a film that used these techniques

was ‘The Infernal Cauldron/Le Chaudran Infernal’, 1903 (Figure 7).



11

Figure 7 – Hand coloured film - The Infernal Cauldron 1903 (Source: Yumibe, 2013).

As films increased in length, and the number of prints soared, hand-colouring became

increasingly less practicable. New methods were being developed to mechanise colouring

and improve the practice of tinting and toning. As a solution, Pathe Freres patented

‘Pathecolor’, a semi-automated device for stencilling prints according to simple colour

correspondences (Cook, 2008).

In America, less expensive tinting and toning processes converted black-and-white

images to colour chemically. However, as soon as the ‘sound-on-disc device’ was replaced

by the recording of sound directly on film, the practice of tinting and toning was

threatened because it became evident that the process affected the quality of the optical

soundtrack.

To combat this problem, Kodak immediately introduced a range of 17 ‘Sonochrome

Positive’ stocks whose soundtrack areas were not affected by the dyeing process. In spite

of this, however, it was eventually decided that post-production conversion of black-and-

white images to colour was less sensible than actually filming with colour stock (Cook,

2008).

Other processes such as ‘Kinimacolor’ (which had been patented in 1906), first began to

appear in public films in 1909. This method employed a standard Bioscope projector

fitted with a shutter of red and green filters rotating at 32 frames per second, and was



12

considered a commercial success. Nevertheless such ‘additive’ colour processes had

several drawbacks, and were soon superseded by other two-colour methods such as

Kodachrome (introduced for stills photography in 1913, and adopted for movies in 1916),

a ‘subtractive’ process in which colour images were formed directly on the celluloid

rather than indirectly on the screen (Cook, 2008).

1920s-195 0’s

Between the 1920’s and 1940’s there was an increased interest in the development of

colour in film, as companies realised the power that colour could have when telling a

story and inferring emotions. Early silent films created an impression of colour film by

hand-tinting each frame but because of the time and labour involved this never became

a widespread phenomenon. When Walt Disney released Flowers and Trees (1932)

(Figure 8), part of the Silly Symphonies series of short subjects, its full colour visuals,

compliments of the new three-strip Technicolor process, were a sensation (Corrigan and

White, 2012).

Figure 8 - Flowers and Trees 1932 (Source: AlwaysDisney, 2014).



13

Technicolor

In the mid-1920’s Technicolor developed a two-colour process, in which two filmstrips –

one red and the other green biased – were pasted together to produce a composite print,

but the limited effects and the various technical limitations, including the double

thickness of the filmstrip and the high light levels required during filming to obtain a

bright enough final image, hardly justified their expense (Cook, 2008).

Finally, in 1929, Warner Bros. released two ‘all-colour, all talking’ features – On with

the Show (Figure 9) and Gold Diggers of Broadway (Figure 10), the first results of a 20-

feature contract Jack Warner had signed with Technicolor.

Figure 9 – On With the Show 1929 (Source: Zhytovoyi, 2015).

Figure 10 – Gold Diggers of Broadway 1929 (Source: Mubi, n.d.).



14

At the beginning of the new decade, when the industry began to feel the effects of The

Depression, the major studios, unable to withdraw from their commitment to sound,

chose instead to reduce their interest in colour cinematography, and the musical – the

genre with which colour had been most closely associated – was briefly considered to be

‘box-office poison’.

Undaunted, Technicolor invested a further $180,000 in their three colour process, and

instead of entering the market themselves, offered exclusive contracts to two

independent production companies – Walt Disney and Pioneer Films. Disney acquired

exclusive rights for colour cartoons and released a series of ‘Silly Symphonies’ that won

critical acclaim, Academy Awards and massive box-office returns.

It wasn’t until 1932 that the “three color” process was perfected. This was a complicated

process that used three strips of black and white negative, filtered so that each would

capture one of the traditional primary yellow, green, and cyan colours. The negatives

were then literally printed onto the positive in ways that allowed dyes, corresponding to

the colours filtered on the negative, to be transferred to the film. The process was

expensive, the equipment huge, and the lighting demands enormous. Also, Technicolor

was a proprietary process so that each studio had to lease equipment and adhere to

protocols (Kolker, 2005; Frisvold Hanssen, 2006).

To ensure control of the colour achieved with their product, Technicolor introduced

“colour consultants”, who planned the colour schemes and compositions. The leading

colour consultant during the 1930s and 1940s was Natalie Kalmus, who understood the

cinema of sound and colour in terms of an “ultimate” art form. The principal task of the

colour consultant was to prepare a colour chart or colour “score” for the entire

production; and compare the preparation of such a chart to the writing of the film’s

musical score (Frisvold Hanssen, 2006). Natalie Kalmus had a distinct style and aparticular idea of what colour on the screen should look like: bright, with a tendency to

vibrant pastels (Figure 11) (Kolker, 2005; Cook, 2008).



15

Figure 11 – Example of Natalie Kalmus colour palette from It’s a Pleasure 1945 (Source:

TheBlondeattheFilm, 2014).

Following Technicolor’s eventual collaborations with Walt Disney and the Oscars for the

best animation shorts at the Academy Awards in 1932 that resulted, the use of colour

began to flourish with The Adventures of Robin Hood in 1938 (Figure 12), The Wizard of

Oz (Figure 13) in 1939 and Gone with the Wind also in 1939 (Figure 14).

Figure 12 – The Adventures of Robin Hood 1938 (Source: INCspot, 2013).



16

Figure 13 – The Wizard of Oz 1939 (Source: Blu-ray, n.d.).

Figure 14 – Gone with the Wind 1939 (Source: Jones, 2014).

This time was seen as the golden time for both Hollywood and Technicolor, who

continued to improve their processes into the 1950’s. However, by 1953 Eastman Color

had replaced Technicolor as a negative source, because of the convenience of shooting a

single negative in a smaller camera. From 1955, the name ‘Technicolor’ only referred to

the laboratory process that produced three technically dyed negatives (Cook, 2007).



17

Modern Day and Digital

I have already noted that colour featured in many of the earliest films as a way of

attracting wider audiences and enhancing the aesthetic and dramatic impact of the

narrative (Everett, 2007. Ever since the beginning of the colour film era, colour

adjustment has been a permanent area of difficulty in the production of moving pictures

(Roderick, 1976). The use of several cameras simultaneously, or at different times and

under varying lighting conditions, results in varying colour rendering in the different

captured shots. When these shots are edited together, the colours must be harmonised,

requiring substantial manual adjustments and the use of colour filters and laboratory

chemicals (Hardeberg et al., 2002).

The introduction of video technologies changed the methods of work, but colour

corrections remained a tedious process, requiring expensive equipment for use in

professional environments. The advent of digital technology in the 1990s has made

possible the saturated visuals of animated films like Up (2009) (Figure , as well as the

subdued palette of the western exteriors of the Coen brothers’ True Grit in 2010, which

was shot on film and adjusted in post-production (Corrigan and White 2012).

Figure 15 - Up, 2009 (Source: IMDB, 2009)



18

Figure 16 – Subdued palette used in True Grit 2010 (Source: Gould, 2015).

The transition from analog to digital video now opens the possibilities for developing

methods of video colour management. Digital video colour management can potentially

be implemented using common computer platforms, and equipment which costs a

fraction of today’s dedicated video editing and colour correction equipment. At the same

time, the processes can be simplified and made less time-consuming (Hardeberg et al.,

2002).

Digital effects and colour grading have opened new possibilities to the use of colour in

films. In Sin City (2005) it allowed colours to be selected and isolated against black and

white backgrounds (Figure 17); producing striking symbolic and a unique film noir

aesthetic.

Figure 17 – Isolated colour (red) used to add contrast in Sin City 2005 (Source: MovieSpot, 2010).



19

In Amélie, a film about pleasure, colour grading has allowed the film to be graded to

such a degree that it is essentially composed of just two main colours, red and green

which symbolise pleasure (Berens, 2014) (Figure 18).

Figure 18 – Screen shot demonstrates the red and green used throughout Amélie 2001 (Source:Miller, 2014).

However digital technology does not always change the way we use colour in films. In

Slumdog Millionaire (a film showing more realism), colour usage is used more subtly

(Figure 19) and realistically like in The Last Emperor and Apocalypse Now (Figure 20)

(Berens, 2014).

Figure 19 – Subtle colours depict reality in Slumdog Millionaire 2008 (Source: Screenmusings,

n.d).

Figure 20 – A more realistic colour palette in Apocalypse Now 1979 (Source: Slarek, n.d.).



20

The Role of Colour in Film

Today, some of us consider black and white “unrealistic” and colour the opposite. From

the 1930’s through the 1950’s, however, exactly the reverse was true. The use of colour

was often considered a distraction and colour was reserved almost exclusively for somemusicals and fantasy films (Kolker, 2005). In the following sections some of the early

thoughts on the use of colour in film have been summarised.

Early thoughts on the use of colour in film

An example of how colour was thought of in the early days of film is to compare it to

music. Although music in film has little to do with ‘realism’, the almost identical rules

governing its use and that of colour serve to pinpoint characteristics that are perceived

as common to both: their intense emotional power, and, alongside this their considerable

disruptive potential. In other words, like music, colour is seen as an invaluable tool for

strengthening both the dramatic and emotional mood of the film and for influencing the

audience’s response (Johnston, 1992; Campbell, 1993; Harman, 1997; Everett, 2007).

But there were also several instances in reviews of early “colour talkers” where the

colours, and the sequences (especially where Technicolor was displayed), were accused of

distracting from other elements. One example is the musical, ‘ Paris’ (1929), which

included two lengthy Technicolor sequences. It was criticised for being “too generously

padded with prismatic sequences’ and the sumptuous colours were accused of “halting

the narrative” and “stealing laughs from the show” (New York Times 1929).

By the second half of the 1950’s, the majority if films were actually produced in colour,

although opinions on its use were still very conservative. Both Andre Bazin and Rudolf

Arnheim, for example, saw colour as a device with the potential to enhance filmic

realism (Bazin 1958, Arnheim 1958). As a result clear rules had already been

formulated to maximize its realistic function. Foremost amongst such rules was the

stipulation that, outside a number of specific genres, including musicals, fantasies, and

cartoons, colour should avoid drawing attention to itself, and instead, aim to remain

unnoticed, even ‘invisible’.

So universal was this view on the conformist use of colour, that the industry produced

manuals such as ‘Elements of Color in Professional Motion Pictures’ (1957) – produced

by a specially constituted committee of the Society of Motion Pictures and TelevisionEngineers, under the chairmanship of Wilton R.Holm. The manual stipulated that



22

Figure 21 – Image showing sallow yellow-green colouration in Seven 1995 (Source: Thoret, 2010).

Many directors subtly choose colour combinations that relate emotions and express their

characters’ state of mind. For example Stanley Kubrick’s last film, Eyes Wide Shut

(1999) (Figure 22), uses blue and gold‐yellow lighting throughout the film so that it

renders and almost painterly coherence of colour (Kolker, 2005).

Figure 22 – Contract between blue and gold in Eyes Wide Shut 1999 (Source: Fantasmagorie,

2012).

In The Cook, the Thief, His Wife & Her Lover (1989) (Figure 23), colour is used to

emphasise or distinguish with the characters themselves rather than just the spaces of

the restaurant. It neutralises the environments, adding a surreal quality to the scenes

(Asm architecture, 2010).

https://asmarchitecture.wordpress.com/author/asmarchitecture/




23

Figure 23 – Surreal colouring used in The Cook, the Thief, His Wife & Her Lover 1989 (Source:

Kafka, n.d.).

Raise The Red Lantern (1991) is about sexual enslavement between four concubines

living in a neutrally toned compound. The internal rooms however, are bathed in rich

bold colours passionately and predominant in bright red (Figure 24), particularly the

lofty red lanterns which is a symbol of passion and power (Classic art films, 2015).

Figure 24 – The use of red throughout Raise The Red Lantern 1991 (Source: Reddit, 2013).



24

From those early days of colour in movies it was realised that colour not only had a

scientific place but that:

‘Colour can have political, religious and cultural connotations, represent

gender and as believed by Kandisnky, have emotional and physical effects

on us. Colour can also improve our memory, influence buying decisions,

indicate meaning and tell stories (Mills, 2015).’

Today the use of colour in cinematography is considered a vital part of creating a movie

and the story it wants to tell. Colour is not only used to achieve verisimilitude in the

images; colour can communicate time and place, define characters, and establish

emotion, mood, atmosphere, and a psychological sensibility (LoBrutto, 2012). As a result

colour palettes for different genres have appeared to become standardised and almost

expected. However, the unusual use of colour can still grab the attention of an audience

and make a film more visually striking.



25

The Use of Colour to Aid Storytelling

“Films use light and colour to tell a story in a special narrative way, which

delivers a strong emotional and intellectual impact on the viewer.”

Martin Scorsese

Long gone are the days of struggling to achieve colour within a film by using multiple

cameras and tinting techniques. These days the use of digital media makes colour an

easily accessible tool to enhance the narrative of a film. Colour has become a vital aspect

of storytelling, playing an important role in affecting the audiences’ emotional response

to a scene.

Colour is a regular feature in the majority of modern narrative films. As such, it is easy

to overlook its appearance, take it for granted, or wait for the moment when it

announces its significance. Some films colour their worlds without involved, provocative,

or profound arrangements, painting-by-numbers as it were. Others strongly assert the

importance of certain colours at particular points of the story or for specific purposes. In

its ability to emphasise moods or specific meanings, in its symbolic and dramatic impact,

colour in film often makes direct statements or glosses key points (Peacock, 2010).

When considering how colour is used in storytelling, it can be separated into two

categories:

Associative Colours

Transitional Colours

These two contrasting concepts will be discussed in the following sections to help show

how a films narrative can be enhanced, thus helping the audience follow the story.

Associative Colours in Storytelling

Whether it be the primary hue of a reoccurring colour scheme or the repetition of

specific colours throughout a film, single consistent colours in a story are used as

associations, all this means is that we associate that colour to a certain subject or an

idea, so let’s say your character is associated with the colour purple, if we proceed to see

purple in the future we will know that scene in some way is referencing the subject.



26

We Need to Talk About Kevin (2011) is a film with very violent scenes that features

almost zero violence, however, the constant appearance of the colour red (Figure 25) acts

as a reminder to the audience that violence is the under-currant to the entire story.

Figure 25 –The colour red appears regularly in We Need to Talk About Kevin 2011 (Source:

Harrison, 2012).

All associations don’t have to follow the same social constraints of a colour, for instance

in The Godfather orange is associated with death (Figure 26). This shows repetition of a

single colour in a scheme, shows some kind of inter-relation to an idea (Criswell, 2015).

Figure 26 – The use of orange throughout The Godfather 1972 (Source: Gonzalez, 2014).

In Traffic (2000), colours mark different narrative strands and indicate spatial

differences along with the mood and atmosphere of the place. Thus we have grainy,

washed-out yellow for Mexico; a solemn blue palette for Cincinnati; and sun-drenched

full colour for San Diego (Cook, 1999), as shown in figure 27.



27

Figure 27 – The use of three colours to depict different areas in Traffic 2000 (Source: Gwilliam,

2014; Mills, 2015; McLeod, n.d. respectively).

Vertigo (1958) uses another example of this, however instead of just one colour it uses

both red and green to its advantage, Scotty’s passion is represented by red and

Madeleine is associated with the colour green (Figure 28). Scotty first see’s Madeleine

wearing a green dress surrounded by red the reds intensity implies that’s Scotty’s

fantasy is dangerous and throughout Vertigo red is noticeable in scenes that are

perilous as Scotty pursues his obsession everything relating to Madeleine is green from

the clothes she wears to the car she drives, later in the film Scotty meets Judy who he

can’t help but imagine as Madeleine so as he wants Judy to become more like her green

begins to re-enter the colour scheme until finally the green from outside the hotel room

fully engulfs Judy in its ominous glow (Criswell, 2015).

Figure 28 – Green associated with Madeline in Vertigo 1958 (Source: Hamer, 2012)

Transitional Colours in Storytelling

So if associative colours represent consistency, then a change in colour shows transition.

If a colour has been associated with a character or subject and that shifts it signifies a

change in something (Criswell, 2015). Transitions can be something as simple as a

location or be something more complex, such as a characters state of mind.



28

In The Last Emperor1987, as the character discovers more about the world around him

the colour palette shifts. The world of tradition in the characters naïve years is

displayed by the colour red, however as the character begins to learn more, the colour

goes from red, to orange, to yellow and finally when he becomes appreciative of his

surroundings he’s bound to green (Figure 29).

Figure 29 – Four images showing the colour transition throughout The Last Emperor 1987

(Source: The Last Emperor film, 2015).

This effective system of colour transition becomes even more unique when it’s examined

on the colour wheel (Figure 30). Red, orange, yellow and green are consecutive – to go

from red to green shows that both the character and the wheel have turned 180 degrees.



29

Figure 30 – Colour Wheel (Source: Goss, D, n.d.).

When you use transitional colour with a character, by altering the colour scheme

associated with them, it can be use to show a change within the character. In Breaking

Bad transitional colour was used to convey the change in moral standing of the main

character, Walter White. Having transgressed into a more villainous state our main

character wears red, a much more nefarious colour. Then just before he travels further

down his own dark path he removes his shirt to reveal a darker one (Figure 31). This

visual presence represents his character arc, something dark lies beneath the surface of

Walt.

Figure 31 – Walter revealing a deeper shade of red below his shirt in Breaking Bad (Source:Breaking Bad, 2012)



30

General Use of Colour for Audience Benefit

As discussed in earlier sections, during the early days, pictures were a mere mechanical

process of imprinting light upon film and projecting that result upon the screen. Then

came the perfection of detail – more accurate sets and costumes – more perfect

photography. The advent of sound brought increased realism through the auditory

sense. The last step, colour, with the addition of visual sensations, completed the

process. Now films are able to duplicate all the auditory and visual sensations. This

enhanced realism enables us to portray life and nature as it really is, and in this respect

we have made definite strides forward. However, a film will merely be an accurate

record of events unless we guide realism into the realms of art (Kalmus, 1935). Kalmus

believed that:

“To accomplish this it becomes necessary to augment the mechanical processes

with the inspirational work of the artist. It is not enough that we put a

perfect record on screen. That record must be moulded according to the basic

principles of art. Colour is ‘fitted’ to the scene. It ‘augments’ its ‘dramatic

value’. Like the use of tinting and toning, colour is determined by the

‘dominant mood or emotion”’.

When used to aid storytelling the colours used can aid the association of characters and

subjects. Films don’t only use colour for multiple stories, they can apply them to set the

overall atmosphere for that particular story. This technique was used as far back as The

Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920), colour was used to define the feel of a whole film, as

shown in Figure 32.

Figure 32 - The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari 1920 (Source: Unaffiliatedcritic, 2013).



31

This is still relevant in the digital age whether the tone is cold and hopeless or gritty

and dangerous the colour serves a purpose, humans will always have certain

psychological reactions to certain colours. Consequently, particular colours are used to

achieve certain reactions. For example red seems to be the colour we have the strongest

reaction to but where one may use it as a depiction of hate and cruelty another may use

it to show passion and love. The same with green, a luscious green field gives us hope –

and shows fertility, but green locations show the mundane and lifeless and the green on

a person tells who the monster is (Criswell, 2015). An example of this is the Wicked

Witch from The Wizard of Oz, as depicted in Figure 33.

Figure 33 – The Wizard of Oz 1938 (Source: Wicked, 2013)

Hullfish (2008) argues that colour is part of the storytelling tools and as such you need

to know the story so you can utilise the correct colours to create the appropriate mood.

Boust et al.’s (2004) study agrees with this and argues that an image can tell two

different stories depending on the colour scheme and gives an example with serious

moments being less saturated. He further comments that serious moments do not have

to be in low saturation but he finds that it help to convey a message to the viewer (Lind-

Valdan, 2013).

Whilst colour can be used in specific ways to indicate a specific subject, they can also

offer a mood/style/look/theme to an entire movie. Bordwell and Thompson (2010) discuss

colour as being a variable in genre classification and state that ‘movies are grouped into

genres by similar plot patterns, thematic implications, filmic techniques, and

recognisable iconography.’ Even further support of colour grading being a genre specific



32

is seen in cinematographer Diogo Martins’ (2011) blog where he states that different

genres have had different colour schemes for the audience to discern between, for many

years. Also Brown et al. (2013) supports this phenomenon about displaying genre-

appropriate colour schemes for classification.



33

The Use of Colour in Genre Distinction

What is Genre?

The word genre has French origin and means kind or type and when talking aboutmovie genres we mean certain types of movies such as action, comedy, horror,

documentary, etc (Lind-Valdan, 2013). The problem with genres occurs when having to

define what a specific genre is. Casetti (1999) put forward that -

“Genre is a collection of shared rules that allows the filmmaker to use

established communicative formulas and the viewer to organise his own

system of expectations”

Genre – or “type” – is a core concept in both film production and the history of film.

Genres play a key role in how movie goers perceive films and are a familiar concept to

viewers seeking to choose which film they wish to see, describe a film, identify,

characterise, and distinguish groups of films that have common traits.

Genre Specific Colour Grading

Genre films are often mass-produced according to a standard generic template (Altman,

1999). A genre film – whether a Western or a musical, a screwball comedy or a gangster

film – involves familiar, essentially one dimensional characters acting out a predictable

story pattern in a familiar setting. During the reign of the major studio system, genre

films comprised the vast majority of the most popular and profitable productions, and

this trend has continued even after its death. In contrast, non-genre films tended to

attract greater critical attention during the studio era, between 1920s and 1960s

(Schatz, 1981), when the ‘major’ studios dominated the production and distribution of

films.

Yet research shows that when watching TV viewers are able to determine the contents’

genres within seconds based on audiovisual cues: is it a comedy, a nonfiction production

or something different (Visch and Tan, 2008). This ability to differ between genres is

important because the different genres may affect how the viewers process the content

showed e.g. a person bumping into another may be considered harmless in a comedy but

in a drama it might be considered significantly different (Visch and Tan, 2008). Some

research shows that, over the past many years, one of the cues to aid the viewers’ classification of films has been genre specific colour grading, meaning that different



34

genres have had different colour schemes to be easily distinguished between (Martins,

2011; Lind-Valdan, 2013). Due to the importance of being able to discern between

genres and the visual cues in form of genre specific colour grading having led the

viewers to expect something familiar from the genres, however, they also do demand

some variations (Bordwell and Thompson, 2010).

Not everybody thinks this is a good thing; in fact many think that the use of standard

templates for colour grading genre type films has become predictable and overused.

“Everything became the same …if a Sci-fi doesn’t look like a genre

film, everyone is afraid no one will see it. The same goes to any

other genre that garners to a niche audience. Mainstream movies

all tend to look the same, everyone afraid to break the mold of a

standardised colour correction, manipulation” (Martins, 2011).

So what are some of these standard genre specific templates and why are they used. In

the following sections we will considered the most common colour correction options

used to depict films from the following genres:

Horror;

Romance/Comedies;

War/Post-Apocalyptic; Science Fiction;

Western;

Action, Drama and Thriller.

Horror

Horror movies tend to have hard, cold blue borderline purple colours, high contrast,

white skin tones, and dark red, borderline black blood (Seitz, 2010; Martins, 2011;

Singh, 2011; Rozier, 2011). This is because there are often negative emotions associated

with these colours. They also fit the criteria for creating tension, isolation and mystery

which is often key to this genre:

Black - Mystery, Death, Evil, Fear, Power, Elegance.

Blue - Cold, Depression, Isolation, Calming, Passive, Unstable.

Examples of movies that fit into this genre include; Paranormal Activity (2007), A

Nightmare on Elm Street (1984), Saw (2004), Poltergeist (2015) and The Cabin in the

Woods (2012) (Figures 34 - 38) respectively.



35

Figure 34 – Paranormal Activity 2007 (Source: Sacks, 2009).

Figure 35 – A Nightmare on Elm Street 1984 (Source: Davis, 2015).



36

Figure 36 – Saw 2004 (Source: Horrorfanzine, 2009).

Figure 37 – Poltergeist 2015 (Source: Roberts, 2015).

Figure 38 – The Cabin in the Woods 2012 (Source: Leavengood, 2015).



37

Romance/Comedy

These films can vary from bright saturated colours, to have a softer palette using

pastels, although they usually consist of warmer colours in general as we associate them

with:

Red – Love, Passion, Excitement, Aroused, Thrilled, Insecure, Power.

Orange – Humour, Emotional, Moods, Daring, Energy, Happy, Warmth.

Yellow – Mixed emotions, Friendliness, Intellect, Caution, Joy.

Examples are Amélie (2001), Titanic (1997) and Love Actually, as depicted in Figures 53

to 55 respectively.

Figure 39 – Amélie 2001 (Source: TimeOutFilm, 2015).

Figure 40 – Titanic 1997 (Source: Harris, 2015).



38

Figure 41 – Love Actually 2003 (Source: Midori, 2015).

Post-apocalyptic / War

Post-apocalyptic movies tend to have desaturated and washed out gray/yellow/green

(earth) colours (Seitz, 2010; Martins, 2011). This can give a softer, more personal feeling

where life and its colours are abandoned for harsh reality. We perceive these as:

Grey – Depression, Loss, Dull, Emotionless, Neutral, Lifeless, Detatched.

Yellow – Challenging, Lacking compassion, Creativity, Complex.

Brown – Reliable, Dull, Honest, Lack of humour, Strength, Predictable.

Examples of movies are The Book of Eli (2010), Children of Men (2006), Death Race

(2008), Terminator: Salvation (2009) and The Road (2009) (Lind-Valdan, 2013). War

movies also tend to be completely desaturated, if not completely, black and white

(Martins, 2011). Examples are American Sniper (2014) and Saving Private Ryan (1998).

Figure 42 – Book of Eli 2010 (Source: Fansshare, n.d.).



39

Figure 43 – Children of Men 2006 (Source: Bri-utiful, 2011).

Figure 44 – Death Race 2008 (Source: Sauriol, 2010).

Figure 45 – Terminator: Salvation 2009 (Source: Couture, 2009).



40

Figure 46 – The Road 2009 (Source: Dashora, n.d.).

Figure 47 – American Sniper 2014 (Source: Mund, 2015).

Figure 48 – Saving Private Ryan 1998 (Source: McHugh, 2014).



41

Science Fiction

In futuristic and sci--fi movies the “reality” is usually displayed in “realistic” colours but

when the reality is off we see a “sodium look” by a monochromatic tinge varying in blue

or green colours (Martins, 2011; Seitz, 2010; Singh, 2011). This colour is usually used to

question reality, if something is right or wrong.

Green - Nature, Materialistic, Reliable, Calm, Adaptable.

Examples of movies are The Matrix (1999), Fight Club (1999), Blade Runner (1982) and

Tron: Legacy (2010) (Lind-Valdan, 2013).

Figure 49 – The Matrix 1999 (Source: Second, n.d.)

Figure 50 – Fight Club 1999 (Source: Dianliwenmi, 2015).



42

Figure 51 – Blade Runner 1982 (Source: BiomechanicalRhetoric, 2012).

Figure 52 – Tron: Legacy 2010 (Source: Starcasm, 2009).

Western

Being one of the oldest film genres, Westerns have had a very varied colour palette,

ranging from Black and White, to the Spaghetti Westerns; in which washed out

yellow/brown/green colours would be used, or saturated to emphasise the location

(deserts) and weather (heat). Examples of this are Once Upon a Time in the West (1968),

The Quick and the Dead (1998) and Django Unchained (2012) (As seen in Figures 53 to

55).



43

Figure 53 – Once Upon a Time in the West 1968 (Source: Thesouloftheplot, 2013).

Figure 54 – The Quick and the Dead 1998 (Source: TheFilmGiant, 2015).

Figure 55 – Django Unchained 2012 (Source: Schaefer, 2012).



44

Action, Drama and Thriller

Action, Drama and Thriller movies in general have much the same colour grading with

desaturated yellow and paste colours, high contrast and hard shadows (Hullfish, 2008;

Martins, 2011; Rozier, 2011; Singh, 2011). These genres try to stay closer to our

perception of reality, very much like a documentary. There are exceptions, but in

general, are shown to be more neutral. Examples of the three types of movies are

(action) Die Hard series, The Hunger Games, (drama) The Fighter, (thriller) Argo. (Lind-

Valdan, 2013).

Figure 56 - Die Hard 5 2013 (Source: Kublog, 2013).

Figure 57 – The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 2 2008 (Source: Highfill, 2015).



45

Figure 58 – The Fighter 2010 (Source: Filmfictioncine, 2011).

Criticisms of Genre specific Colouration

O’ Brother Where Art Thou (2000) was one of the first films to use digital colour grading.

The Coen Brothers reportedly wanted it to look retrograde at the expense of realism,

which is why it was graded so heavily: the entire movie is warm sepia (Priceonomics,

2015). This digital landmark in colour correction, kick-started genre colouring.

Figure 59 – Image showing retrograde colouring in O’ Brother Where Art Thou 2000 (Source:

Filmap, n.d.).

Since then, the trend has caught on, but the most common concern is the objection to

genre specific colour grading. According to bloggers – all movies are starting to look the

same due to the “teal and orange” look (as seen in Figures 60 – 66) but they are also

genre specifically colour graded, so all movies belonging to a specific genre look the

same, but differs from other genres (Lind-Valdan, 2013).



46

Hollywood movies usually try to use complimentary colours on the opposite side of the

colour wheel. Examples are green and red (Figure 18), yellow and purple and blue (teal)

and orange (Figure 30).

Figure 60 – Orange & Blue Movie Posters (Source: Barackman, 2013).

Figure 61 – Drive 2011 (Source: Proctor, 2013).



47

Figure 62 – GI Joe Retaliation 2013 (Source: Paprocki, 2013).

Figure 63 – Battleship 2012 (Source: Pandolfini, 2015).

Figure 64 – Transformers 2007 (Source: Tooze, 2008).

The present problem that is derived from bloggers’ statements, suggesting genre specific

colour grading in films, making every genre movie ‘look alike (Lind-Valdan, 2013)’, is

explained and verified by Lee:

“Common colours, like common foods, are monotonous: they may become tiresome”

(Lee, 2005)



48

As previously mentioned, audiences expect something familiar in genre films (Lind-

Valdan, 2013), however the demand for something fresh seems to be present (Bordwell

and Thompson, 2010). Some of the arguments as to why these bloggers get so distressed

by the “teal and orange” look are that they think it becomes an unnatural (Seitz, 2010),

fake, manipulated, and abused distortion (Martins, 2011) of something that does not

need the visual colour aesthetic (Singh, 2011).

One example of a film that utilises a limited colour scheme is Black Hawk Down (2001).

Predominant green and sand tone, the military is associated with green, with terrain in

Somalia sand-coloured. So the colour scheme is consistent with the environment and

characters. But Scott and his creative team go too far.

Figure 65 – The overuse of green altered the appearance Black Hawk Down 2001 (Source:

WallpaperUP, n.d.).

LoBrutto (202) states “it is so heavily green-toned that the colour extends to the sky and

skin tones, it distracts from the characters and action, leaving the viewer wondering

why this colour dominates; consciously looking for a metaphor or meaning that is never

delivered. The film quickly begins to look more like a music video than a dramatic

motion picture story”.

Subtle use of a wider palette, at least in some locations and scenes, would have

tempered this obvious exercise in style as style and not as storytelling.

As previously mentioned in an earlier chapter, the manual ‘Elements of Color in

Professional Motion’ was produced in 1957. This stipulated that colour should be

subordinate to the narrative and, in no circumstances, constitutes ‘a separate entity to

compete with or detract from the dramatic content of the picture’ (SMPTE 1957).



49

Practical Application of Genre Specific Colour

The use of digital technologies to create a standard colour template for a specific genre

has become easily accessible with the improvement of colour grading software such as

Red Giant and DaVinci Resolve.

The editing suite by Adobe - Premiere Pro can use a plugin called Red Giant – ‘Magic

Bullet Looks 3’ (Figure 67) which provides the user with 198 colour grading presets

(some are shown in Figure 68). These are based on popular film and TV shows and their

associated genres. They can be applied and adjusted or started from new.

Figure 66 – Screenshot of Red Giant – Magic Bullet Looks 3 (Source: MBL1, 2015).

Figure 67 – Closer view of the preset options in Red Giant (Source: Toolfarm, n.d).



50

Some examples:

Blockbuster (Action); Classic Epic, Frontage, Chronometer, Classic Tension.

Blockbuster Cool (Horror/Sci-fi); Classic Zombies, Pelham, Frost, Blockbuster

Warm (Romantic/Western); Classic Warm and Fuzzy, Siam, Amberchrome,.

Mono Film Stock (Noir); Sepiatone, Halide, Kodak 5231 Push 2, Prolostia 2000. Times and Places (Tints); Classic Sunny Delight, Beijing, Rio, Moscow.

The practical element of this project aims to take short, simple pieces of footage and

demonstrate how by applying colour correction, a specific genre can be recreated.

Methodology

In order to demonstrate how the colour of a film can alter the impression the audience

can have of a move, I used colour grading to recreate industry standard genre templates.

I produced three video clips each were filmed according to the following criteria: Neutral colouring;

Static camera;

Small amount of movement within the frame;

Natural light;

No modern objects;

No additional sound.

This was designed to give me a neutral image, with some movement to keep the viewer

stimulated and not distracted by anything other than the colours. Each 10 second clip

then had a colour treatment applied to the raw footage. This was done in Premiere Pro

CC with the aid of colour correction programs. The templates chosen were based on four

of those discussed in the sections above and are widely known genres. The basic colour

description applied for each is below:

Horror – Blue hue with dark shadows;

Romantic – Orange and yellow hue;

War/Post-Apocalyptic – Grey, brown, green hue, heavily desaturated;

Western – Black and white, yellow hue.

It should be noted that other effects were kept to a minimum in order to ensure the

colour was the main factor altering the appearance of the video clip.

Results

The results of the practical application of colour grading can be seen on the memory

stick attached in Appendix 1. On the next page, Table 1 shows screen shots of the clips

with different colour grading applied.



51

Table 1 - Results from the practical element of the project, showing screen shots from the three clips subjected to colour correction



52

Conclusion

The review of literature and practical application of colour correction confirms that

colour plays an important role in films. Like any three dimensional character, colour

often has complex and seemingly contradictory properties (Berens, 2014), even within acertain cultural perspective, thus giving richness to cinema. Whether the goal is to

convey realism, to invoke certain emotions, or to use the diverse symbolic meanings of

colour, colour is a very important part of the visual integrity of motion pictures (Jørholt,

1998).

Since the introduction of colour into film, we have been programmed to associate colours

with particular cues and emotions, be it tension, anger, sadness or laughter.

Consequently, by learning more about colour science, cinematographers will gain

improved knowledge to aid the creation of ever more meaningful and more emotionally

powerful narratives (Berens, 2014).

As has been demonstrated throughout this project, the use of colour correction to

achieve a certain look has always been an option desired by film makers. Though no

definitive reasons, other than the initial conceptualisation of pioneering

directors/cinematographers, give a reason to why genres are depicted with certain

colours. The use of colour to enhance the storytelling quality and manipulate a films

audience has been influenced by several key changes in industry and theories (Table 2):

Table 2 - Major changes and theories that contributed to modern colour correction techniques

Industry Changes Contributing Theories

Hand painting of prints showed

people what was possible – Méliès and

Edison

Issac Newton determined that white light was

made up seven colours

Development of Technicolor process

Natalie Kalmus set up rules with regards to

applying colour to a story as a Technicolor

consultant

Film stock that could record sound

allowing the two to be combined

SMPTE set up a standard for the use of colour

to prevent it distracting from the narrative

The introduction of digital technologyThe Cohen Brothers break the mold and apply

digital colour correction to the whole image

Use of computers in a home setting

allows easy colour correction by

anyone

Genre specific colour corrections become

standard



53

As we discovered in previous sections, Natalie Kalmas had a large impact on the use of

colour in film. She had creative control over how colour was depicted, when the studios

used Technicolor. Since then it has often been asserted that genres give cinema an

effective model for industrial production, because they provide a proven formula that

precedes and determines what should be produced. By applying a tried and tested

method, usually including a standard colour template, that will guarantee the success of

a film to a new subject, producers minimise their risks and justify their production.

This is a significant problem as it suggests that commercial or popular cinema, along

with cartoons, television, or popular fiction, are only capable of endlessly and

mechanically reproducing prefabricated models. Furthermore this vision of mass culture

is completely static: we now have a generation of films that all look the same. Artistic

vision is far less common, as if it doesn’t fit into a typical genre model, it may be too

risky to back financially.

This is especially true in Hollywood where criticism of the continual churning out of

movie clones (in terms of colour) has led to some directors turning away accepted colour

standards. European filmmakers seem to have more creative freedom in this respect, as

their productions show, this system of rinse and repeat only serves to stifle creativity

and would seem to imply a rather low opinion of popular culture (Morin 1962; Moineand Radner, 2008).

The overall goal of film makers is to make sure that the creative use of colour in the

production of all types of moving pictures is not compromised because of technological

limitations. However, the establishment of digital cinema now ensures the future of

colour grading is one that will be more accessible to consumers, as work stations and

software are becoming cheaper, easier to use and more accessible. This will help smaller

production houses with limited resources, therefore increasing the possibilities forproduction and distribution (Hardeberg et al., 2002) and hopefully differentiation from

the accepted norm. At present the ease of colour grading and the economic drive for

genre films have essentially restricted the use of artistic colour and vision to a greater

extent than the standards published by the Society of Motion Picture and Television

Engineers in 1957. It would appear conformity is preferential to imagination, which is a

shame for an industry that brings dreams to life. There is also a worry that the skills

once required to produce unique colour techniques - colouring for the camera instead of

doing it all in post production - will be lost.

https://archive.org/search.php?query=creator%3A%22Society+of+Motion+Picture+and+Television+Engineers%22






54

References

Bibliography

Altman, R., (1999). Film/Genre, British Film Institute.

Ambrose, G. & Harris, P., (2005). Colour. Lausanne: AVA Publishing SA.

Arnheim, R., (1958), Film as Art, London: Faber and Faber.

Aslam, M.M., (2006). Are you selling the right colour? A cross-cultural review of colour

as a marketing cue. Journal of marketing communications, 12(1), pp.15 – 30.

Bagchi, R. & Cheema, A., (2013). The effect of red background color on willingness-to-

pay: The moderating role of selling mechanism. Journal of Consumer Research,39(5), pp.947 – 960.

Bazin, A., (1967), What is Cinema? Vol.1, Berkeley: University of California Press.

Essays selected and ranslated by H.Gray.

Bellantoni, P., (2012). If it’s purple, someone’s gonna die: the power of color in visual

storytelling, CRC Press.

Berens, D.J., (2014). The Role of Colour in Films: Influencing the Audiences Mood.

Bordwell, D and Thompson, K., (1990) Film art: an introduction. 3rd ed. New

Bordwell, D. and Thompson, K., (2010). Film Art: An Introduction. 9th edition. New

York: McGraw Hill, 2010, ISBN: 978‐0-07-122057-‐6 York: McGraw-Hill

Publishing Company.

Boust, C. et al. (2004) Does an Expert Use Memory Colors to Adjust Images? Society for

Imaging Science and Technology [Internet], 12 November, pp.347- 353.

Brown, S., Street, S. and Watkins, L. (2013). Color and the Moving Image: History,

Theory, Aesthetics, Archive. USA, Routledge.

Byrne, A. and Hilbert, D.R., (1997). Readings on Color: The Philosophy of Color.

Massachusetts: MIT Press.

Campbell, J., (1993), ‘A Simple View of Colour’, In Alex Byrne & David Hilbert (eds.),

Readings on Color. MIT Press.

Casetti, F., (1999) Theories of Cinema 1945-1995, Austin, University of Texas Press.p64

Coates, P., (2010). Cinema and colour: the saturated image, Palgrave Macmillan.

Cook, P., (2008). The Cinema Book. BFI Publishing; 3rd Revised edition



55

Corrigan, T. & White, P., (2012). The film experience: An introduction, Macmillan.

Crozier, W. Ray (1996), "The Psychology of Colour Preferences," Review of progress in

Coloration and Related Topics, Vol. 26, Bradford: Society of Dyers and

Colouxists. 63-72.

Dalle Vacche, A. & Price, B., (2006). Color, the film reader, Routledge.

Darling, D., (1991). Making Light Work: The Science of Optics (Experiment!). Published

by Dillon Pr, 1991, ISBN: 10:0875184766 / ISBN: 13:9780875184760. Available

at: http://www.daviddarling.info/childrens_encyclopedia/light_Chapter6.html

Everett, W., (2007). Questions of colour in cinema: from paintbrush to pixel, Peter Lang.

Fagerholm, C., (2009). The use of colour in movie poster design: an analysis of four

genres.

Frisvold, H, E., (2006). Early Discourses on Colour and Cinema. Stockholm,

Departmentof Cinema Studies, Stockholm University, 81.

Fuensanta A. Vera-Díaz and Doble, Nathan., (2012). The Human Eye and Adaptive

Optics, Topics in Adaptive Optics, Dr. Bob Tyson (Ed.), ISBN: 978-953-307-949-

3, InTech, DOI: 10.5772/31073. Available at:

http://www.intechopen.com/books/topics-in-adaptive-optics/the-need-for-

adaptive-optics-in-the-human-eye <Accessed: 12/08/15>

Galileo., (1989). The Assayer (1623), in Michael R. Mathews (ed.), The Scientific

Background to Modern Philosophy: Selected Readings, Indianapolis: Hackett

Publishing.

Hardeberg, J.Y. et al., (2002). Color management for digital video: Color correction in

the editing phase. In International IARIGAI Research Conference.

Harman, G., (1997), Explaining Objective Colour in Terms of Subjective Reactions, in

Byrne and Hilbert 1997a, pp. 247 – 262.

Hemphill, M., (1996). “A Note on Adults’ Color-Emotion Associations,” Journal ofGenetic Psychology: Research and Theory on Human Development, 157 (3),

275 – 80.

Henry, P., Cheung, V. and Westland, S., (2008). Accuracy of Cross-Media Colour

Memory, Leeds, The Colour Group.

http://www.colour.org.uk/Henry%20paper.pdf <Accessed: 08/08/15>

Hullfish, S., (2008), The Art and Technique of Digital Color Correction. Focal Press. 2, 5

http://www.daviddarling.info/childrens_encyclopedia/light_Chapter6.html



http://www.intechopen.com/books/topics-in-adaptive-optics/the-need-for-adaptive-optics-in-the-human-eye



http://www.colour.org.uk/Henry%20paper.pdf








56

Hupka, R, B., Zaleski, Z,. Otto, J., Reidl, L,. and Tarabrina N.V., (1997), "The Colors of

Anger, Envy, Fear, and Jealousy; A Cross-Cultural Study," Journal of Cross-

Cultural Psychology, 28 (2), 156 — 171.

Huntley, J., (1949), British Technicolor Films, London: Skelton Robinson.

Hurkman, A. (2011) Color Correction Handbook: Processional Techniques for Video And

Cinema. USA, Peachpit Press.

Kalmus, N.M., (1935). Color Consciousness, Journal of the Society of Motion Picture

Engineers, 25:2, 1935, 147.

Kennedy, B., (2000). Deleuze and Cinema - The Aesthetics of Sensation 1st ed.,

Edinburgh University Press.

Kodak, (2007). Motion Picture Colour Theory.

Kolker, R.P., (2005). Film, form, and culture 3rd ed., McGraw-Hill Companies.

Kosslyn, S.M., and Thompson, W.L., (2003), When is early visual cortex activated during

visual mental imagery? Theory and meta-analysis, Psychological Bulletin, 129

(5), 723-746.

Lindgren, E., (1963), The Art of the Film, London: George Allen and Unwin.

Lind-Valdan, C., (2013), Genre Specific Color Grading and Ideals in Film.

LoBrutto, V., (2002). The filmmaker’s guide to production design, Allworth Press.

Madden, T. J., Hewitt, K. and Roth, M. (2000), "Managing Images in Different Cultures:

A Cross- National Study of Color Meanings and Preferences,"JournaI of

lnternatianal Marketing, 8 (4), 90-107.

Magrin-chagnolleau, I., (2013), The Use of Colour in Theater and Film. Unpub.

University of Paris Sorbonne. Available at: http://www.institut-

acte.cnrs.fr/espas/files/2013/12/THE-USE-OF-COLOR-IN-THEATER-AND-

FILM.pdf

Martins, D. (2011a), America’s Color Grading Mania and its Influence Over

the World I. Available at:

http://diogocam.com/2011/10/02/america’s‐color‐grading-

mania‐and‐its‐influence‐over‐ the‐world (Accessed 12th August 2015)

Martins, D., (2011b), America’s Color Grading Mania and its Influence over the

World I. Available at:


mania‐and‐its‐influence‐over‐ the‐world-ii (Accessed 12th August 2015)

http://www.institut-acte.cnrs.fr/espas/files/2013/12/THE-USE-OF-COLOR-IN-THEATER-AND-FILM.pdf










57

Martins, D., (2011c), America’s Color Grading Mania and its Influence over the

World I. Available at:


mania‐and‐its‐influence‐over‐ the‐world-iii (Accessed 12th August 2015)

Maszerowska, A., (2012). Casting the light on cinema-how luminance and contrast

patterns create meaning. In MonTI. pp. 0065 – 85. Available at:

http://rua.ua.es/dspace/bitstream/10045/26940/1/MonTI_04_04.pdf

Mather, G., (2006). Foundations of perception, Taylor & Francis.

Mills, R., (2015). Colour and Storytelling in Films. Available at:

http://www.robertmills.me/colour-and-storytelling-in-films/

Moine, R., Fox, A. & Radner, H., (2008). Cinema genre, Wiley-Blackwell.

Morin, E., (1962) L’Esprit du tempts, Paris, Grasset.

Moser, M., (2003). “United we brand: How to create a cohesive brand that’s seen, heard

and remembered.” Boston, Massachusetts: Harvard Business School Press.

Neale, S., (1985). Cinema and technology: image, sound, colour, Indiana University

Press.

New York Times., (1929). Mordaunt Hall, “Irene Bordoni and Jack Buchanan”, The New

York Times, November 8, 1929, 31:2.

Peacock, S., (2010). Colour, University of Manchester Press.

Roderick, R. (1976). Color in the motion-picture industry. SMPTE Journal, 85, 496 – 504.

Rozier, M., (2011). Colour Correction and Grading Part 1. Blind Crow Pictures.

Available at:

http://www.blindcrowpictures.com/film/2011/10/colour‐correction‐and‐grading‐p

art‐1/

Schatz, T., (1981). Hollywood genres: Formulas, filmmaking, and the studio system,

McGraw-Hill.

SMPTE, (1957). Elements of Color in Professional Motion Pictures’. Society of Motion

Picture and Television Engineers. New York

Turner, G., (2002). The film cultures reader, Psychology Press.

Vacche, A.D. and Price, B., (2006). Color, the film reader. Routledge

Vernet, M., (1978). Film Genre - Film and the Other Arts, Macmillan.










58

Visch, V. and Tan, E., (2008). Narrative versus Style: Effect of Genre Typical Events

versus Genre Typical Filmic Realizations on Film Viewers' Genre Recognition.

Running head: Narrative versus style, POETICS vol 36, issue 4

Xue, S. et al., (2013). Learning and applying color styles from feature films. In Computer

Graphics Forum. pp. 255 – 264.

Webography

AlwaysDisney, (2014). 82 Years Ago Today. Available at:

http://www.alwaysdisney.com/82-years-ago-today/ <Accessed: 13/08/15>

Asmarchitecture, (2010). Use of Color as a metaphor for transformation. Available at:

https://asmarchitecture.wordpress.com/2010/03/09/the-cook-the-thief-his-wife-

and-her-lover-use-of-color-as-a-metaphor-for-transformation/ <Accessed:

19/08/15>

Barackman, N., (2013). Why all movie posters look the same. Available at:

http://www.thewrap.com/why-movie-posters-all-look-same-75846/ <Accessed:

13/08/15>

Barolet, D. MD., (2008). Light-Emitting Diodes (LEDs) in Dermatology, Semin Cutan

Med Surg 2008, 27: 227-238. Available at: http://www.illumask.com/about-

us/science-of-light-therapy/ <Accessed: 08/08/15>

BiomechanicalRhetoric, (2012). The focus of Mise en Scene in Blade Runner. Availableat: https://biomechanicalrhetoric.wordpress.com/2012/09/13/the-focus-of-mise-

en-scene-in-blade-runner/ <Accessed: 13/08/15>

Blu-ray, n.d. The Wizard of Oz – Blu-ray review. Available at: http://www.blu-

ray.com/movies/The-Wizard-of-Oz-Blu-ray/7703/ <Accessed: 20/08/15>

BreakingBad, (2012). Video. Available at: https://youtu.be/9JS-iK0lD0s <Accessed:

19/08/15>

Bri-utiful, (2011). Evolution of Apocalyptic Themes in Movies. Available at: http://bri-

utiful.hubpages.com/hub/Evolution-of-Apocalyptic-Themes-in-Movies <Accessed:

19/08/15>

Classicartfilms, (2015). Raise the Red Lantern Film Essays. Available at:

http://www.classicartfilms.com/raise-the-red-lantern-1991 <Accessed: 18/08/15>

Couture, J., (2009). New images from 'Terminator Salvation'. Available at:

http://videoeta.com/news/2754/new-images-from-terminator-salvation/

<Accessed: 19/08/15>

Criswell, L., (2015). Colour in Storytelling. Video. Available at:https://youtu.be/aXgFcNUWqX0 <Accessed: 13/08/15>

http://www.alwaysdisney.com/82-years-ago-today/



https://asmarchitecture.wordpress.com/2010/03/09/the-cook-the-thief-his-wife-and-her-lover-use-of-color-as-a-metaphor-for-transformation/



http://www.thewrap.com/why-movie-posters-all-look-same-75846/


http://www.illumask.com/about-us/science-of-light-therapy/




https://biomechanicalrhetoric.wordpress.com/2012/09/13/the-focus-of-mise-en-scene-in-blade-runner/




http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/The-Wizard-of-Oz-Blu-ray/7703/




https://youtu.be/9JS-iK0lD0s



http://bri-utiful.hubpages.com/hub/Evolution-of-Apocalyptic-Themes-in-Movies




http://www.classicartfilms.com/raise-the-red-lantern-1991




https://youtu.be/aXgFcNUWqX0





















59

Dashora., N, n.d. What is the most visually atmospheric film you have ever seen, in

terms of cinematography?. Available at: http://www.quora.com/What-is-the-

most-visually-atmospheric-film-you-have-ever-seen-in-terms-of-cinematography


Davis, J., (2015). The Anatomy of a remake: A Nightmare on Elm Street. Available at:

http://crypticrock.com/the-anatomy-of-a-remake-a-nightmare-on-elm-street/


Dianliwenmi, (2015). Fight Club. Available at:

http://www.dianliwenmi.com/postimg_139244.html <Accessed: 02/08/15>

Ebert, R., (2004). Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. Available at:

http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/eternal-sunshine-of-the-spotless-mind-2004


Fantasmagorie, (2012). Eyes Wide Shut. Available at:

http://fantasmagorie.unblog.fr/page/5/ <Accessed: 13/08/15>

Fansshare, n.d. Book of Eli Wallpaper. Available at:

http://cdn26.us2.fansshare.com/photo/wallpaper1920x1080/book-of-eli-blu-ray-

screen-shot-wallpaper-games-2039057565.jpg <Accessed: 19/08/15>

Filmap., n.d. Film locations in Googlemaps. Available at:

http://filmap.tumblr.com/post/90261475757/o-brother-where-art-thou-joel-coen-

ethan-coen <Accessed: 13/08/15>

Filmfictioncine, (2011). The Fighter is Bale. Available at:

http://filmfictioncine.blogspot.co.uk/2011/02/el-peleador.html <Accessed:

13/08/15>

Ford, A., (2011). Second MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE GHOST PROTOCOL Trailer.

Available at: http://www.filmofilia.com/wp-

content/uploads/2011/10/mi4_tom_cruise-3.jpg <Accessed: 13/ 08/15>

Gould, J., (2015). Resurrecting the classic western – how to save a dying genre.

Available at: http://geekandsundry.com/resurrecting-the-classic-western-how-to-

save-a-dying-genre/ <Accessed: 19/08/15>

Gonzalez, N., (2014) The Godfather and Oranges. Available at:

http://es.klear.com/profile/naiara_glez <Accessed: 15/08/15>

Goss, D., n.d. Color Boom. Available at: http://noblack.be/color-blocking-2/ <Accessed:

19/08/15>

Gunadjaja, K., (2012). Development of colour. Available at: http://the-colour-

theory.blogspot.co.uk/ <Accessed: 10/08/15>

http://www.quora.com/What-is-the-most-visually-atmospheric-film-you-have-ever-seen-in-terms-of-cinematography






http://www.dianliwenmi.com/postimg_139244.html




http://fantasmagorie.unblog.fr/page/5/


http://cdn26.us2.fansshare.com/photo/wallpaper1920x1080/book-of-eli-blu-ray-screen-shot-wallpaper-games-2039057565.jpg



http://filmap.tumblr.com/post/90261475757/o-brother-where-art-thou-joel-coen-ethan-coen



http://filmfictioncine.blogspot.co.uk/2011/02/el-peleador.html


http://www.filmofilia.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/mi4_tom_cruise-3.jpg



http://geekandsundry.com/resurrecting-the-classic-western-how-to-save-a-dying-genre/




http://es.klear.com/profile/naiara_glez


http://noblack.be/color-blocking-2/


http://the-colour-theory.blogspot.co.uk/

























60

Gwilliam, AJ., (2014). 30 Film Directors Every Highsnobiety Reader Should Know.

Available at: http://www.highsnobiety.com/2014/10/21/30-film-directors-every-

highsnob-reader-should-know/ <Accessed: 15/08/15>

Hamer, R., (2012).10 Greatest Films of All Time. Available at:

http://www.awardscircuit.com/2012/06/14/10-greatest-films-of-all-time-robert/


Harris, R., (2015). This Insane 'Titanic' Theory Will Blow You Away... Jack Is a Time-

Traveler Sent from the Future!. Available at:

http://moviepilot.com/posts/2015/02/24/this-insane-titanic-theory-will-blow-you-

away-jack-is-a-time-traveler-sent-from-the-future-2724611 <Accessed:

13/08/15>

Harrison, W., (2012). We Need to Talk About Kevin (Blu-ray). Available at:

http://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/56478/we-need-to-talk-about-kevin/ <Accessed:13/08/15>

Highfill, S (2015). The Hunger Games. Available at:

http://www.ew.com/article/2015/06/09/hunger-games-mockingjay-part-2-trailer-

deep-dive <Accessed: 19/08/15>

Horrorfanzine, (2009). Movie Review: Saw (2004). Available at:

http://horrorfanzine.com/movie-review-saw-2004/ <Accessed: 19/08/15>

INCspot, (2013). The INCspotlight: The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938). Available at:

http://channelawesome.com/forums/xfa-blog-entry/the-incspotlight-the-

adventures-of-robin-hood-1938.181/ <Accessed: 13/08/15>

Jeffryn, (2009). Star Wars. Available at: http://jeffryn.com/blog/2015/02/page/48/


Jones, V., (2014). Long in the Wind. Available at:

http://thefilmographer.blogspot.co.uk/2014/02/long-in-wind.html

Kafka, n.d. The Cook, the Thief, his Wife and her Lover. Available at: http://kafka-on-

the-shore.tumblr.com/post/3830668015/the-cook-the-thief-his-wife-her-lover-

1989 <Accessed: 13/08/15>

Kublog, (2013). "Die Hard" - 5: Americans do not believe in our border guards. Available

at: http://www.kublog.ru/blog/kino/242.html <Accessed: 13/08/15>

Leavengood, J., (2015). A certified bro’s perspective on Fifty Shades of Grey (2015).

Available at: http://moviesfilmsandflix.com/2015/02/20/a-certified-bros-

perspective-on-fifty-shades-of-grey-2015/ <Accessed: 19/08/15>

Marshall, P., (2015), 12 colours and their meanings. Available at:http://filmdirectingtips.com/archives/157 (Accessed 7th August 2015).

http://www.highsnobiety.com/2014/10/21/30-film-directors-every-highsnob-reader-should-know/






http://moviepilot.com/posts/2015/02/24/this-insane-titanic-theory-will-blow-you-away-jack-is-a-time-traveler-sent-from-the-future-2724611



http://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/56478/we-need-to-talk-about-kevin/


http://www.ew.com/article/2015/06/09/hunger-games-mockingjay-part-2-trailer-deep-dive



http://horrorfanzine.com/movie-review-saw-2004/


http://channelawesome.com/forums/xfa-blog-entry/the-incspotlight-the-adventures-of-robin-hood-1938.181/



http://jeffryn.com/blog/2015/02/page/48/




http://kafka-on-the-shore.tumblr.com/post/3830668015/the-cook-the-thief-his-wife-her-lover-1989





http://www.kublog.ru/blog/kino/242.html



http://moviesfilmsandflix.com/2015/02/20/a-certified-bros-perspective-on-fifty-shades-of-grey-2015/




http://filmdirectingtips.com/archives/157
























61

MBL1 (2015)., Magic Bullet Looks 3. Available at:

https://www.redgiant.com/products/magic-bullet-looks/ <Accessed: 06/08/15>

McHugh (2014)., Top three war movies I always go back to. Available at:

http://mchughreviews.com/2014/10/16/top-three-war-movies-i-always-go-back-to/


McLeod, M., n.d. (Traffic (US - DVD R1). Available at:

http://www.dvdactive.com/reviews/dvd/traffic.html <Accessed: 15/08/15>

Midori, (2015), Love Actually. Available at:

http://dituttounpobymidori.blogspot.co.uk/2015/04/love-atually-lamore-

davvero.html <Accessed: 13/08/15>

Miller, R., (2014). Lights, Camera, Fashion: The 50 Most Stylish Movies Ever. Available

at: http://www.popsugar.com.au/fashion/Most-Stylish-Movies-34460041#opening-slide <Accessed: 13/08/15>

MovieSpot., (2010). Sin City. Available at: http://the-

moviespot.blogspot.co.uk/2010/07/sin-city.html <Accessed: 13/08/15>

Mubi., n.d., Gold Diggers of Broadway. Available at: https://mubi.com/films/gold-diggers-

of-1933 <Accessed: 20/08/15>

Mund, S., (2015). American Sniper. Available at:

http://revistamonet.globo.com/Revista/noticia/2015/02/o-que-esperar-de-sniper-

americano-baseado-em-autobiografia-e-indicado-ao-oscar-2015.html <Accessed:

19/08/15>

Pandolfini., (2015). Battleship weapons. Available at:

http://www.imfdb.org/wiki/Battleship_(2012) <Accessed: 19/08/15>

Paprocki, M., (2013). G.I Joe: Retaliation 3D Review. Available at:

http://www.doblu.com/2013/07/15/gi-joe-retaliation-3d-bluray-review/ <Accessed:

13/08/15>

Priceonomics., (2015). Why Every Movie Looks Sort of Orange and Blue. Available at:http://priceonomics.com/why-every-movie-looks-sort-of-orange-and-blue/


Proctor, B., (2013). Drive. Available at: https://bproc.wordpress.com/2013/03/14/drive-

2011/ <Accessed: 13/08/15>

Reddit., (2013). Raise The Red Lantern Pictures. Available at:

https://www.reddit.com/r/TrueFilm/comments/1e9krs/the_truefilm_inventory_1_

colour/ <Accessed: 18/08/15>

https://www.redgiant.com/products/magic-bullet-looks/




http://www.dvdactive.com/reviews/dvd/traffic.html


http://dituttounpobymidori.blogspot.co.uk/2015/04/love-atually-lamore-davvero.html



http://www.popsugar.com.au/fashion/Most-Stylish-Movies-34460041#opening-slide




http://the-moviespot.blogspot.co.uk/2010/07/sin-city.html




https://mubi.com/films/gold-diggers-of-1933




http://revistamonet.globo.com/Revista/noticia/2015/02/o-que-esperar-de-sniper-americano-baseado-em-autobiografia-e-indicado-ao-oscar-2015.html



http://www.imfdb.org/wiki/Battleship_(2012)


http://www.doblu.com/2013/07/15/gi-joe-retaliation-3d-bluray-review/


http://priceonomics.com/why-every-movie-looks-sort-of-orange-and-blue/


https://bproc.wordpress.com/2013/03/14/drive-2011/




https://www.reddit.com/r/TrueFilm/comments/1e9krs/the_truefilm_inventory_1_colour/

























62

Roberts, J., (2015). Poltergeist remake trailer. Available at:

http://www.glidemagazine.com/129990/poltergeist-remake-trailer/ <Accessed:

19/08/15>

Sacks, E., (2009). Horror film 'Paranormal Activity' scares up millions for 1st-time

director Oren Peli on $15K budget. Available at:

http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/tv-movies/horror-film-paranormal-

activity-scares-millions-1st-time-director-oren-peli-15k-budget-article-1.382204


Sauriol, P., (2010). Death Race 2 is underway. Available at:

http://coronacomingattractions.com/news/death-race-2-underway <Accessed:

19/08/15>

Schaefer, S,. (2012). Early ‘Django Unchained’ Footage Descriptions & Reactions.

http://screenrant.com/django-unchained-trailer-footage-sandy-173522/ <Accessed: 20/08/15>

Screenmusings, n.d. Slumdog Millionaire Movie Screencaps. Available at:

http://screenmusings.org/SlumdogMillionaire/index.htm <Accessed: 13/08/15>

Second, T., n.d. Movie Inspiration #4: The Matrix: Haters still Hate? Available at:

http://fierydragon.com/dragonsbreath/?p=1286 <Accessed: 13/08/15>

Seitz, D., (2010). 5 Annoying Trends That Make Every Movie Look the Same.

CRACKED.com. Available at:

http://www.cracked.com/article_18664_5‐annoying‐trends‐that‐make‐

every‐movie‐look‐same.html <Accessed: 09/08/15>

Singh, R., (2011). Making the Digital Grade. FLIKS. Available at:

http://www.flicks.co.nz/blog/film‐is‐a-harsh‐mistress/making‐the‐digital‐grade/


Slarek, n.d. A UK Blu-ray review of APOCALYPSE NOW. Available at:

http://www.cineoutsider.com/reviews/bluray/a/apocalypse_now_br.html


Starcasm, (2009). Tron Legacy 2009 Comic-Con Panel Video. Available at:

http://starcasm.net/archives/9688 <Accessed: 19/08/15>

TheBlondeattheFilm, (2014). A Pleasure hotel lobby. Available at:

http://theblondeatthefilm.com/2014/03/24/its-a-pleasure-1945/a-pleasure-hotel-

lobby/ <Accessed: 20/08/15>

TheFilmGiant, (2015). The good the bad the quick and the dead? (the west is getting

busy). Available at:

https://moviesbeforeandafter.wordpress.com/2015/07/08/the-good-the-bad-the-quick-and-the-dead-the-west-is-getting-busy/ <Accessed: 19/08/15>

http://www.glidemagazine.com/129990/poltergeist-remake-trailer/


http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/tv-movies/horror-film-paranormal-activity-scares-millions-1st-time-director-oren-peli-15k-budget-article-1.382204



http://coronacomingattractions.com/news/death-race-2-underway


http://screenrant.com/django-unchained-trailer-footage-sandy-173522/


http://screenmusings.org/SlumdogMillionaire/index.htm


http://fierydragon.com/dragonsbreath/?p=1286


http://www.flicks.co.nz/blog/film%E2%80%90is%E2%80%90a-harsh%E2%80%90mistress/making%E2%80%90the%E2%80%90digital%E2%80%90grade/
















http://starcasm.net/archives/9688


http://theblondeatthefilm.com/2014/03/24/its-a-pleasure-1945/a-pleasure-hotel-lobby/



https://moviesbeforeandafter.wordpress.com/2015/07/08/the-good-the-bad-the-quick-and-the-dead-the-west-is-getting-busy/



















63

TheLastEmp, (2015). TheLast Emperor film. Video. Available at:

https://youtu.be/RierIgQ_r88 <Accessed: 19/08/15>

Thesouloftheplot, (2013).The Soul of the plot: Once Upon a Time in the West. Available

at: https://thesouloftheplot.wordpress.com/2013/04/05/once-upon-a-time-in-the-

west/ <Accessed: 19/08/15>

Thoret, J. B., (2010). Seven. Available at: http://www.avcesar.com/test/bluray/id-

764/seven.html <Accessed: 13/08/15>

TimeOutFilm, (2015) The 100 best romantic movies. Available at:

http://www.timeout.com/london/film/100-best-romantic-movies-list <Accessed:

20/08/15>

Toolfarm, n.d. Magic Bullet Looks Presets. Available at:

http://www.toolfarm.com/product/magic_bullet_looks/training <Accessed:06/08/15>

Tooze., G. W. (2008). Transformers film review. Available at:

http://www.dvdbeaver.com/film2/DVDReviews40/transformers_blu-ray.htm


Unaffiliatedcritic, (2013). The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari. Available at:

http://unaffiliatedcritic.com/2013/01/the-cabinet-of-dr-caligari-1920-

independent-study-in-world-cinema/ <Accessed: 19/08/15>

WallpaperUP, n.d. Black Hawk Down wallpaper. Available at:

http://www.wallpaperup.com/223835/BLACK-HAWK-

DOWN_drama_history_war_action_black_hawk_down_military_ew.html


Wicked, (2013). Wicked Film. Video. Available at: https://youtu.be/a0QFaro0JFU


Yumibe, J., (2013). French Film Colorists. Available at:

https://wfpp.cdrs.columbia.edu/essay/french-film-colorists/ <Accessed: 07/08/15>

Yurek, J., (2013). How much color gamut do displays really need? Part 2: How we

perceive color. Available at: http://dot-color.com/2013/07/16/how-much-color-

gamut-do-displays-really-need-part-2-how-we-perceive-color/ <Accessed:

11/08/15>

Zhytovoyi, M., (2015). What distinguished the present day in the history? Available at:

http://natemu.info/schodennik-marti-zhitovoyi/28-travnya-793.html <Accessed:

20/08/15>

https://youtu.be/RierIgQ_r88


https://thesouloftheplot.wordpress.com/2013/04/05/once-upon-a-time-in-the-west/




http://www.avcesar.com/test/bluray/id-764/seven.html



http://www.timeout.com/london/film/100-best-romantic-movies-list


http://www.toolfarm.com/product/magic_bullet_looks/training




http://unaffiliatedcritic.com/2013/01/the-cabinet-of-dr-caligari-1920-independent-study-in-world-cinema/



http://www.wallpaperup.com/223835/BLACK-HAWK-DOWN_drama_history_war_action_black_hawk_down_military_ew.html



https://youtu.be/a0QFaro0JFU



https://wfpp.cdrs.columbia.edu/essay/french-film-colorists/


http://dot-color.com/2013/07/16/how-much-color-gamut-do-displays-really-need-part-2-how-we-perceive-color/




http://natemu.info/schodennik-marti-zhitovoyi/28-travnya-793.html





















64

Filmography

Film Year Director

A Nightmare on Elm Street 1985 Wes Craven

Amélie 2001 Jean-Pierre Jeunet

American Sniper 2014 Clint Eastwood

Apocalypse Now 1979 Francis Ford Coppola

Battleship 2012 Peter Berg

Black Hawk Down 2001 Ridley Scott

Blade Runner 1982 Ridley Scott

Book of Eli 2010 Allen Hughes, Albert Hughes

Breaking Bad 2013Michelle MacLaren, Adam Bernstein, Vince Gilliganet al.

Children of Men 2006 Alfonso Cuarón

Death Race 2008 Paul W. S. Anderson

Die Hard 5 2013 John Moore

Django Unchained 2012 Quentin Tarantino

Drive 2011 Nicolas Winding Refn

Eyes Wide Shut 1999 Stanley Kubrick

Fight Club 1999 David Fincher

Flowers and Trees 1932 Burt Gillett

G.I. Joe: Retaliation 2013 Jon M. Chu

Gold Diggers of Broadway 1929 Roy Del Ruth

Gone with the Wind 1939 Victor Fleming, George Cukor, Sam Wood

It’s A Pleasure 1945 William A. Seiter

Love Actually 2003 Richard Curtis

Mission Impossible - Ghost

Protocol 2011 Brad Bird

O' Brother Where Art Thou 2000 Joel Coen, Ethan Coen

On with the Show 1929 Alan Crosland

Once Upon a Time in the West 1968 Sergio Leone

Paranormal Activity 2007 Oren Peli

Paris 1929 Clarence G. Badger

Poltergeist 2015 Gil Kenan

Raise the Red Lantern 1991 Yimou Zhang



65

Reboot 2012 Joe Kawasaki

Saving Private Ryan 1998 Steven Spielberg

Saw 2004 James Wan

Seven 1995 David Fincher

Sin City 2005 Frank Miller, Robert Rodriguez, Quentin Tarantino

Slumdog Millionaire 2008 Danny Boyle

Star Wars 1977 George Lucas

Terminator: Salvation 2009 Joseph McGinty Nichol

The Adventures of Robin Hood 1938 Michael Curtiz, William Keighley

The Cabin in the Woods 2012 Drew Goddard

The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari 1920 Robert Wiene

The Cook, the thief, His Wife and

Her Lover 1989 Peter Greenaway

The Fighter 2010 David O. Russell

The Godfather 1972 Francis Ford Coppola

The Hunger Games 2008 Gary Ross

The Infernal Cauldron 1903 George Méliès

The Last Emperor 1987 Bernardo Bertolucci

The Matrix 1999 Andy Wachowski, Lana Wachowski

The Quick and the Dead 1998 Sam Raimi

The Ring 2002 Gore Verbinski

The Road 2009 John Hillcoat

The Wizard of Oz 1939 Victor Fleming

Titanic 1997 James Cameron

Traffic 2000 Steven Soderbergh

Transformers 2007 Michael Bay

Tron: Legacy 2010 Joseph Kosinski

True Grit 2010 Joel Coen, Ethan Coen

Up 2009 Pete Docter, Bob Peterson

Vertigo 1958 Alfred Hitchcock

We Need to Talk About Kevin 2011 Lynne Ramsay



A PPENDIX I

Attached to the hardcopies of this document are memory sticks with the film clips for

the practical element

The Use of Colour in Cinematography: Storytelling & Genre

Documents

Transcript of The Use of Colour in Cinematography: Storytelling & Genre