Frank Field Photography

Continuing with the subject of color or monochrome for images taken in the fog, I’ll look at two more pairs of images and then come to some conclusions.

(Click on any image to expand; use arrow keys to navigate among images.)

The first image was captured in fairly heavy fog and not long after sunrise.  Without doubt, I much prefer the color version.  Like our previous images, differential color saturation enhances depth.  Colors in the nearest parts of the bluff are lightly saturated while color saturation decreases as the bluff recedes into the fog.  Further, the blue cast (most evident in the sky) enhances the cold mood of the fog.  The monochrome version of this image lacks both of these features.

The image of Del Mar Point was captured on a day with much lighter fog.  I prefer the monochrome version of this image.  With light fog, it’s hard to detect the differential color saturation and thus the color does not add to depth of the image.  The foreground elements are quite close to the camera and saturation is not the least reduced by the fog.  The monochrome version tends to abstract the image and I think that adds to the mood of (light) fog.

When I started this investigation of images of fog, I expected that conversion to monochrome would be a “no brainer.”  Much to my surprise, I have tended to prefer the color versions where light color saturation in the foreground gives way to even less saturation in the background, enhancing depth.

Like most photographers, I tend to learn by doing.  The advent of digital photography has dramatically shortened the learning feedback loop while enabling experiments that would have been much more difficult to do with film.  I now plan to investigate the question of color versus monochrome in images of another favorite subject: eroding sandstone.

My last post looked at color and monochrome versions of an image taken at the ocean bluff in the morning fog.  I tentatively concluded, to my surprise, that I preferred the color version even though the subject is nearly monochrome.  I found that color, slightly saturated in the foreground and less so in the background (viewed through the fog), tended to enhance the sense of depth in the image.

Here are color and black and white versions of a second image.

(Click on either image to expand.  Use arrow keys to navigate between images.)

I’m having a hard time deciding which version I prefer.  The sweeping view of the bluff, clearly receding into the fog, already imparts a strong sense of depth in the image.  The differential saturation of the colors, near versus far, does not seem to add as much as it did in the image I posted last week.  Too, the abstraction of black and white tends to add to the sense of mystery in the image, making us wonder even more what is hiding in the fog.  Guess I will need to live with both images for a while before I can decide.

What do you think?

At last some good ground fog!  Now, more decisions.

(Click on an image to expand, use arrow keys to toggle between images.)

Fog season was late this year but did finally start about a month ago.  We have had nearly continuous low overcast but only a small number of days of actual ground fog.  The low overcast has tended to persist overnight, limiting radiational cooling of the land and keeping temperatures just a bit too warm for fog at ground level.  Yesterday, the overcast cleared late in the afternoon and remained clear past sunset; this allowed just enough cooling to produce fog at ground level this morning.

Here is one of the images I captured today.  Now for decisions.  With relatively heavy fog, colors tend to be very muted and the landscape seems almost monochromatic to the eye.  I expected this image would be a natural for conversion to monochrome (aka “Black & White”).  I’m not so sure that is the case.

My preference is tending toward the color version.  Depth is implied in this image by the progression of three arms of the bluff.  Detail is evident in the foreground arm while the mid-ground and background arms progressively disappear into the fog.  I think that the muted colors on the foreground arm tend to make the foreground more notable and the others, with colors progressively swamped out by fog, seem recede further in the background.  That is, color by its presence in the foreground and absence in the background is subtly increasing depth to the image.

I’d like to hear about your preference and thoughts and welcome your comments below.

While fog occurs throughout the year, I think of the period from mid-June to mid-August as “fog season” in coastal Sonoma County.  Fog is both more frequent and heavier than at other times of the year.  It’s a great time to be out with the camera!  Fog imparts an especially quiet mood on the landscape, helps to isolate subjects from backgrounds, and helps to imply infinity (as subjects disappear into the fog). I plan to make an extra effort this year to be out in the landscape when morning fog appears.

Images captured in the fog can be nearly monochromatic and thus great candidates for conversion to black and white.  One of my goals for the year has been to learn more about black and white conversion.  I think “fog season” may be just the motivation I need to give black and white a try.

This image was captured at minus tide at Ohlson Beach at The Sea Ranch last Wednesday.  With a very thick fog, wet sand and wet sandstone, the source image is nearly monochromatic.  I did the conversion to B&W in Lightroom V3 and used Photoshop to further optimize the image — largely to bring out some of the texture and glow in the sandstone.

While I think conversion of this image is reasonably successful, I am also finding that good conversion is a challenge with many images.  The best guidance I have found so far basically boils down to “try multiple approaches.”  Well, yes, but there has to be better guidance than that! A lot to learn and I will plan to post more as I progress.