I’m always looking for more information on the subject of color in photography. Recently while wandering around in the “rabbit hole” of the web I came across Herb Paynter and his blog “The Way Eye Sees It”
http://thewayeyeseesit.com/
I read a couple of posts and found his writing to be fresh and informative. I downloaded a free eBook of his titled “The Elements of Digital Color Photography” and saw right away that Herb had done a great job explaining some of the fundamentals of how and why we photographers use color in our work. With simple language and excellent illustrations he covered a lot of ground and clarified a few things I wasn’t aware of.
After reading the free eBook I decided to read another of his books “Accurate Color” which is a much more in depth exploration of  the processes involved in color photography and the whole process from camera to final output of the image . Herb explains how the various systems in photography and printing interact and why they respond as they do. His descriptions and illustrations make the material easy to comprehend while also being entertaining.
The version I have of the book is titled ” The Enlighten Project: The Accurate Color Interactive Audio Video Text Book”. It has the complete text of his text book by the same title with the additional features of an audio feature that provides narration of the instructional pages and chapters and 1.5 hours of animated visuals and illustrations that further explain the concepts he talks about. There are review questions after each chapter to help you check yourself to see if you have gotten the info as well as a list of the top ten takeaways from each chapter.
I recommend that anyone who wants to improve their photography get a copy of “Accurate Color” and learn the fundamentals of accurate color and how to achieve the best results when applying the basic principles of the digital photography process from beginning to end. I know that I’m glad I chose to read these books and that I added to my knowledge of digital image making.
Here’s a link to the book:
https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/accurate-color-audio-video/id509451372?mt=11
Thanks for the recommend. Will definitely follow too. 🙂
I think you’ll be glad you followed him.
In order to produce black and white/ sepia from original subjects that have color, one must understand color. For example, if I convert a red brick building with gray wooden doors to a black and white or sepia photograph, it is essential that I understant the tonalities of the colors of that building. Color lays the foundation for many monochromatic images as well as those that use a full palette. The book sounds great! It’s on my list!
Good point Ellen, without an understanding of color it can be very difficult to envision the final image when working in B&W and Sepia.
As always Nick, thanks for sharing!
My pleasure Phyllis.