Colour Scripts

Colour scripts are extremely useful for conveying the mood of a scene and how the feel of the film or game changes as the story progresses. Below are small examples of colour scripts by Pixar and Dreamworks. The first is for the animated film 'WALL-E' and demonstrates a colour shift from red/browns to purples to blues and greens. Each little section has its own atmosphere. The warmer sections are more friendly and safe whereas the colder colours change the mood and feel more futuristic and clean. In the script for 'Megamind' the blues seem foreboding and the reds and oranges signify danger which is then neutralised by good.

Confusion

Understanding colour theory can help us create atmospheres with certain moods and in Faith No More's music video for the song 'Falling to Pieces', the mood is confusion and disorientation. The video flicks between shots taken in a variety of colourful spaces. The shots are for the most part very quick and choppy and the quick change in colour confuses the eye. The subject matter seems very random, disorientating the viewer further, for example a few times in the video we see bright orange giant  goldfish swimming in the foreground of a lime green shot. All the high contrast is shocking and manic, somewhat reflecting the lyrics of the song.

Rayman: Origins

Rayman: Origins has a charming style bursting with colour. Floriane Marchix was a concept artist for the game (she now works at Dreamworks) and below are two sets of images by her plus some small screenshots from the game. The first main image shows how she tweaked the lighting and colours to achieve quite different moods in her work while the second better shows the intensity of the colours she used in her concept art. The small thumbnail screenshots demonstrate the vibrant use of colour throughout the game and the environments that are brought to life.

Red and Blue

Below are 3 stills from Aladdin. In this scene everything is tinted with red to match the situation in the story. It seems evil is triumphing, however there is still hope. The blue of the genie and magic carpet represents good and hope. The princess, Jasmine, clings onto the blue cloth then drops it when she attempts to distract Jafar with a seductive act. This could be a symbol of Jasmine hiding her good side to trick him.

Electric!

The image below is the artwork for the album 'Live After Death' by Iron Maiden (artwork by Derek Riggs). While the yellow/greens and blues aren't that far off balanced in terms of area proportionally, the yellow hues are vibrant and contrasting. This colour scheme accentuates the powerful subject matter and gives it a bizarre and monstrous appearance, with the light blue highlights in particular bringing out the electric feel and the energy of the image. As a whole the artwork reflects the genre of music well, making for a good album cover.

Colour Proportion

Rummaging through my bookmarks earlier I rediscovered the deviantart page of Cyril Rolando, known as `AquaSixio (links to his deviant art and his website). His use of colour is absolutely beautiful. The two images in this post are good examples of the effect of colour proportion on atmosphere. The first image, Les promesses d'une romance, is dominated by warm orangey hues and radiates warmth, while the second, Coeurs fondants, feels icy and isolated. The oranges in the first piece are of an intense hue but because the small amount of blue is enhanced by the surrounding colours the two hues battle for attention. In the second piece the ratio of orange to blue is almost flipped, however the orange, being a warm colour, is brought forward though diminished slightly by the swathes of blue.

Les promesses d'une romance

Coeurs fondants

The desaturation of Halo

So it's been eleven years since Halo: Combat Evolved was released and in that time the Halo series has developed a lot. One thing that has changed a fair bit is the use of colour. As shown in the image below the armour colour of the protagonist, Master Chief, has become less and less saturated over time. The same can be said for numerous aspects of the game and it would seem that desaturated, gritty visuals have been becoming more and more popular over the years.