Value

“Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole” created by Animal Logic is perhaps my favourite movie. Despite being biased to animation and anything with talking animals, this movie really hit the nail on the head for me. Story aside, the shots themselves are beautiful. As opposed to the previous post, the colour schemes used in this film are more subdued and passive, but they go a long way to contributing to the story. The image below is from a moment in the film where the owl on the right has escaped from a horrible place, and has just found an owl he doesn't know (on the left), who lives in the area. Straight away the colour reinforces the notion of being in an alien world. The owl on the left 'Digger' takes on the colours of the environment much more than Soren, the right-hand owl. The blues and broken hues of the background seem evident more in Digger's Colour than in Soren's. There surroundings are lighter and less saturated because of the fog, whereas the characters themselves have a darker more saturated palette, making them stand out and look unwelcome in the frosty scenery. Although blue and orange are complimentary, in this case that goes towards distancing Soren from the environment, which is exactly the idea as he stands out as though he doesn't belong. This is a part eerie moment in the film, and the less saturated broken colours add to the uncertainty and alien feel of the situation.

Winnie the Pooh is known for it's charming watercolour imagery both in the books and in the scenery of the cartoon version. This piece of concept work for the location “Pooh Sticks Bridge” shows the same qualities in it's colour scheme. Although it can be said that trees are brown, leaves are green, etc, this piece packs every element full of colour. The shaded areas are soften not only by the nature of the medium, but also in the colours found within. For instance, the shaded areas of the tree trunks, take on the blue from the sky, as do a lot of other elements in the piece such as the bridge and even the leaves in places. This colour combination not only gives way to an appropriate stone for darker areas, but creates a wonderful atmospheric haze in setting that lends to that fuzzy summer's day feeling. The piece overall is very light and desaturated, with the more darker areas such as the roots of the tree of the left serving as slight tints to contrast with the surrounding elements. The piece lacks any true darkness because of the light and happy mood it is portraying.  

Flaunting an atmospheric sepia pallet, Juanjo Gaurnido's 'BLACKSAD' comics provide an excellent example of how to lead the eye to points of interest using opposing values and contrasting lighting set-ups. The comic's pages are very detailed and painstakingly produced, so to direct the readers attention to the vital parts of each scenario, value is heavily relied on to give focus amongst the clutter.. In this instance, the elements closer to the light of the window have a more solid colour, whereas areas such as the corner of the room sport darker shades of red and green. Some aspects such as the notice board on the far right, make used of a very subtle mix of colours that distinguish from each other by a very small margin, making the reader deem them as something of little interest. However, John Blacksad's black fur is a strong dark tint amongst the much lighter values surrounding it, this establishes him as the main point of focus, and so the reader's attention will rest mostly on the feline figure.