Digital colour fundamentals everyone should know
What you'll learn
- Learn how the primary colours of light and ink are different and used to define all other colours.
- Learn how digital colours are defined to understand all your options when editing images
- Learn how to set brightness and contrast for the most striking appearances of photos.
- Learn how to use a histogram as the perfect tool to evaluate your photos under any lighting condition and on any monitor.
- Learn to use colour levels as a much faster method to correct brightness and contrast optimally
- Learn to how colour curves can be used as an all-in-one tool, or just for fun, to create artistic images
- Learn where to find free quality stock images and photographs
- Useful resources are provided.
- If you or someone you know is colour blind, the histogram is a must to use for creating well colour balanced images for others.
Requirements
- Basic computer skills are required.
- Prior knowledge of photo editing is not required but can be useful since this course will benefit both groups.
- Access to a computer (Windows/Linux/Mac).
Description
If you are like me, seldomly happy to share a photo as-is, without making it look better first, and not just apply a filter or some automated colour adjustment, this is the course for you.
In this course, you will learn the fundamentals of colour that underpins digital photo editing, from how colour is formed and defined to how to measure and manipulate it effectively to save time making drastic improvements easily, using free or professional photo editing software.
These fundamentals are not linked to any particular software or toolsets. It can also be applied using popular online photo gallery services such as Google Photos or Apple iCloud Photo, or even your phone's default gallery app!
In this course, free photo editing desktop software (GIMP) will be provided for you to practise with in case you do not have access to commercial software such as Adobe Photoshop, LightRoom etc.
Where AI, filters and automated colour enhancements to photos falter, your skills can put your ideas ahead of the rest.
You will be surprised how many otherwise useless digital images can be rescued or given a second life if you understand how to read colour channel information from a histogram and identify what information is still usable in the image to repair, modify or improve it dramatically.
I will also share my favourite free stock photo and image sources on the internet and provide ample practical examples to experiment with in each lecture to ensure you get hands-on experience to cement your newly acquired knowledge.
I can never accept the default version of a photo I took or use it in a PowerPoint presentation or other digital platform as-is, without making fine adjustments first. These colour fundamentals that I studied and learnt over the years helped me to create even better-looking images than those automatic adjustments most photo apps can do for you.
Who this course is for:
- If you like to make your photos and images look much better than what automated steps or filters can do for you
- Anyone editing photos and images in digital form.
- Hobbyists and professional photo editors.
- Anyone sharing digital images for personal or professional reasons.
- When you are not satisfied with the automatic improvements of photo apps and online services
- When you can see when a photo looks better but don't understand why.
- When you want to modify existing photos or images for presentations or online use.
Instructor
- 4.4 Instructor Rating
- 29 Reviews
- 148 Students
- 1 Course
Almost all successful people will tell you that if you want to know what your are passionate about, ask yourself what you are willing to do right through the night, even if there is no big benefit, need or motivation to.
For me its creating a clear visual message using the right photos and images. Adding the right image to any presentation, blog post, online tutorial or website is what can keep me going for hours.
My photo and image editing skills made that possible and makes me strive to learn more and more techniques everyday to get to what I want faster. I also love finding new software and apps with which to do interesting things, but nothing beats that personal touch to an image.
Apart from being an engineer with most of my experience being in simulation and analysis and the sales and support thereof, I enjoy teaching complicated material and always strives to make things simpler and easier to learn to people who otherwise wouldn't.
Visual aids are always a great tool to help me transfer knowledge and sell a product. I have created many blogs in which I expose people to advanced technologies, to help them get started instead of deciding its too complicated right away. I love technology and can't help myself but to share it with others. I also know that today our human creativity is our biggest asset and heaven forbid that it would ever be possible for a computer to be creative too!