Here's How Color Filters Can Create Powerful Avatar Imagery

Cajsa Lilliehook covers the best in virtual world screenshot art and digital painting

Channon’s “It’s Complicated” is a wonderful example of how powerful a duotone can be. They don’t have to be black and white and different colors bring subtly different subtext. Blue is associated with the freedom of the wide open skies. It’s a futuristic color, frequently the color of lighting in space movies and tv series. Think of Tron. [See trailer here.] The bright, blue light of this duotone is the color of the future. 

To see more examples of Charron’s use of color, click here:

“Somewhat moody” is not a duotone. Here she uses a purple light or EEP to illuminate her avatar. You see a lot of purple associated with magic, showing up in Goth and Halloween pictures and clothing. That’s due to its long history of being a color reserved to the powerful, royalty and priests. This picture has a Gothic feeling thanks to the baroque lace and pendant as well as the color purple.

“The Beauty of Life” is another example of color carrying the story forward with its light blue to pale lavender colors. Light blue, unlike the bold cyanic blue of the first picture, suggests tranquility and peace while lavender symbolizes beauty. This is a peaceful picture, gentle and full of beauty. This is true not just of the avatar, but of the setting also. 

Channon’s photostream is full of examples where color is used symbolically. For example, in “Aftermath” the color in the distance is red, the color of war and violence. She is walking away from the battle, it is literally the aftermath. In another called “Destroyed” she uses black, the color of death and destruction. I do not know she is making these color decisions deliberately since they are cultural tropes in the West that are so much a part of us marketers use them to sell their brands. Color works at a level that we are often unaware of and it’s fun to see how people use color in their pictures. 

 

See all of Cajsa's Choices here. Follow Cajsa on Flickr, on Twitter, on her blog, and on her Ko-Fi.

Comments

[Channon Upshaw]

Cajsa

Thank you so much for the honor of putting some of my photos on your blog. I'm so flattered and grateful for the kind words you have used in describing some of my favorite photos. Thank you again, I truly am honored.

Channon Upshaw