{"id":8707,"date":"2013-10-18T09:57:19","date_gmt":"2013-10-18T13:57:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/scienceblogs.com\/principles\/?p=8707"},"modified":"2013-10-18T09:57:19","modified_gmt":"2013-10-18T13:57:19","slug":"optics-question-how-did-the-photographer-do-that","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/2013\/10\/18\/optics-question-how-did-the-photographer-do-that\/","title":{"rendered":"Optics Question: How Did the Photographer Do That?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Yes, that’s another TED@NYC picture as the “featured image,” but don’t run away! It’s a post about science, I swear!<\/p>\n

The photo up above is from the Flickr set<\/a> (which, by the way, has been edited significantly since yesterday…), and I like it a good deal. Mostly because, as the joking caption suggests, that photo of Max Planck looming over my head has a kind of serial killer vibe to it. But here’s the thing: this is the original phtoo that’s on the slide:<\/p>\n

\"Max<\/a>
Max Planck around the time he solved the black-body radiation problem. From wikimedia.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

It’s a black-and-white photo from 1901<\/a>, and in my slides, it’s black and white. But in that photo, it’s got an interesting orangey-red cast to it. Which works really well in the context of the picture– it stands out nicely from the blue-lit back wall, and contrasts with my “gonna be on tv” light-blue shirt. It’d be a less effective photo if it were shown in true color.<\/p>\n

My question, though, is how did the photographer get that effect? I don’t think it’s a PhotoShop thing, because nearly all the photos of speakers with slides behind them have the same thing going on, with the slides having an orange-y tint. On the other hand, it’s only nearly<\/em> all of the photos, not absolutely all of them. So it’s got to be something that was done deliberately to get that effect in places where it’s appropriate to have it.<\/p>\n

But while I applaud the artistic judgement, I don’t understand how they did it. It’s got to be some trick of lighting and focus. The shot is focused on me, with a smallish depth of field, and I’m lit by really bright lights placed near the front of the stage (that, happily for nervous speakers, partly obscured the crowd), so maybe it just looks reddish because of lower light levels (when I take shots of the kids in inadequate light, they tend to be a little reddish). But it seems a little too specific for that, and again, some other shots (like this one<\/a> where you can see 1) the tiny stage, 2) the TED sign, and 3) my white sneakers…) have slides that are closer to their true color.<\/p>\n

Anyway, I know just enough about photography to be dangerous, but I know there are people who read this with way more experience and knowledge than I have. So I figured I’d throw this out there for those folks: How did the photographer get that effect?<\/p>\n

(Repeat of the image for those reading in RSS who don’t see the “featured image”:)<\/p>\n

\"Max<\/a>
Max Planck knows what I did last summer. (Photo by Ryan Lash)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Yes, that’s another TED@NYC picture as the “featured image,” but don’t run away! It’s a post about science, I swear! The photo up above is from the Flickr set (which, by the way, has been edited significantly since yesterday…), and I like it a good deal. Mostly because, as the joking caption suggests, that photo… Continue reading Optics Question: How Did the Photographer Do That?<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":8691,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[73,238,7,50,37,11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8707","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-art","category-optics","category-physics","category-pictures","category-pop_culture","category-science","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8707","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8707"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8707\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8691"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8707"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8707"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8707"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}