Outstanding Photos with Partial Color

Beautiful.

Tacky and antiquated.

Good collection… Thanks for sharing!!!

Mind boggling and exceptional.

Some brilliant examples here, time to fire up Photoshop

Some really nice examples, have always loved the effect created, incorporating htis into a website at the moment actually so good timing!

Lovely collection

Cheap. On of the most kitschy effects ever.

Awesome collection! I love that effect

Simply Beautiful. Amazing.

This is always a nice technique. Great examples.

When used right, it can be really exceptional.

My previous attempt at Partial Colour using Aperture 3

http://www.flickr.com/photos/jordanmerrick/4398935351/

really outstanding collection..amazing list..keep it up!

Nice list, this really gives an extra effect to the photos.

this style is so outdated and overdone… some examples are nice, but most are very ordinary… even though i am not a fan of this sort of stuff i think i’ve seen a lot better…

I have clicked and processed one of the golden temple.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/baggaz/4322776700/

Cheers!

Beautiful pictures. I enjoyed it.

way cool list of images.

Some are good (pregnant, rusted spring…) but some are plain… useless (the one with the drinks, the picture quality isn’t even good to start with and, the one with the leaf, it’s not like it needed colors to get my attention on it).

I wish you would have argued as to “why” they are that good, each one of them. That requires actual knowledge and gives people tools to recrete a good effect. I know it would take a lot more time to right but you’d have bonified the quality of the article. Maybe next time?

Photographers call it Spot Coloring. It’s the artistic equivalent of painting by numbers. Or maybe Popsicle stick art. It was interesting 30 years ago when it was being done in a lab. Photoshop has made it trivial.

partial coloring is lame, was ever lame and will always be lame.

This is not a good post. Very tacky and very unoriginal. In fact, it is my pet peeve when photographers do this. I think anyone can desaturate a photo and go over with the history brush!! Come on WDD!!

Some good shots there. I have to admit that some of them look a bit cheesy, but done well it looks great. I suppose it’s like HDR in a way! I think the best ones were the ones that just had one colour and looked quite subtle in a way. The umbrellas, post box and yellow wellingtons were great! Nice list!

This is one I did several years ago
http://www.flickr.com/photos/blakehelms/109216082/in/set-72057594074290688/

Hi,

Great Collection! great idea!
i am trying this technique in my next project.

Seriously? This technique was “cool” in the mid-90s with those oh-so-cute cards with kids dressed as adults and bright red roses, but now it’s tacky.

Not that great, if I’m honest…
Very amateur photos.

The problem with this effect is that in almost every case it’s not the most interesting or compelling improvement upon the original. Any improvement is a lazy improvement. Photoshop 101. Imagine if you had the “negative”. Some of this photography is great. So much potential there. What would you do with it?

If spot coloring has artistic merit, then what about a print done with phosphorescent inks on black velvet and then displayed under a black light?

Yes! It is so exciting to see a Professional Face Painter added in this mix. I was thinking to myself if I could use something like that

That does it.. I have to do something like this ASAP.. Really really nice samples

creative art, excellent collection

Shot from the last year
http://www.flickr.com/photos/chainreactionmedia/3474574840/

great images!!

I like this technique and I like contrast in any possible form or shape. I also tried it few years ago with this photo: http://www.flickr.com/photos/aiveldesign/3778501376/

AMAZING!
can you write tutorial for this?

Some beautiful photography, hindered only by the emo myspace partial color thing. Honestly the ladybug/bird and post box are beautiful looking, but the rest is shocking bad. The little girls eyes for example. That didn’t even look good in 1992.

brillant

Great work by photoshop! Some examples are so particular…the best for me is the blond child and your eyes blu sky! So brilliant!

I really amazed on seeing this collection. Specially the girl with blue eyes really impressive work…

Nice post!
I love this kind of art, but how many people said before, it can be tacky, kitsch and many other things. I believe the reason for a kind of this work be good you need to incorporate in the hole work the part of it you want to call attention, but you need to call attention too, so, it can be very complex to do a great partial color work!
=D

Creative pictures. Very good list.

These are so beautiful!
It makes me wanna grab my camera and shoot some myself!!

Nice post some good work.

The main image of the post is quite awesome. The little lady with blue eyes. Others are also quite good too.

Nice post some good work.

Got to agree with some others.

Some are VERY tacky, and not done well at all.

Its always overdone with new photographers as they think its an amazing new technique.

Some of the examples I liked, but the majority were terrible.

I tried one of these a while ago after I saw a moth on a walk one day. http://tuestunim.deviantart.com/art/Moth-on-a-flower-132378522

Bit of selecting, desaturation, mucking about with the background and a bit of an effect on the flower. I’d say it’s more of a graphic design thing than a web thing. Put it this way – I’ve never used it on a website in all the years I’ve been making them – but nice all the same.

Here’s my best:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/craz11/2606004164/

Man I hate this type of photo editing. It shows a lack of skill and creativity. It is used to try and make a crappy picture look good. It fails every time. On the rare occasion it works but man is it rare.

The lady alone on the bridge with an umbrella is really fascinating. All the others are also great and this technique has increased the glamour of the images.

Some of these photos are beautiful. The hydrant, and especially the orange umbrella!
But others aren’t.

In my eyes, a color key is well-used if this effect intensifies something that already is within the photo. On a rainy day the streets already seem already grey. Making them completely grey is taking the effekt one step further.

But some photos are just ordinary – and try to become something different, special through the color key. Let’s take the photo with the cocktails. It IS a nice picture, a nice memory, but for me as a stranger there’s nothing special in it. The color key doesn’t change this. It creates a “wow”-effect for many people, but if you look twice it still is just an ordinary photo. Far from outstanding.

Great collection.

Wow .. Great piece of work !!

great examples i will keep it in mind tnx

Have to agree with some previous comments. These effects appear very kitschy and nonsensical. They reduce the value of an otherwise good shot rather than adding to it. In most cases they look more like a desperate attempt to make a bad photo look presentable. A lot of these black & white photos look flat, there’s not much contrast, they lack composition, and they look like like just what they are… digicam tourist-snapshots shot in color switched to grayscale mode. I can see there’s a market for this technique perhaps in advertising to highlight a product… I have seen that used there before. But that’s about the only place I can see a use for it.

Which ones are the “outstanding” pictures? I just see a bunch of extremely average shots with some tacky colour popping.

It wouldn’t be so bad if it was done well, but even the attempts themselves are amaterish.

I’ve noticed these photosites are running extremely low on content recently. Do you guys just scan Flickr for anything you can find?

Is so, here’s my page:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/johngodwin/

Build whatever you like out of that, because it’s at least as good as what’s on here.

Maybe you can do something like “outstanding photos by people whose names bagin with the letter ‘J’”

Here’s a nice one with a ladybug:

http://www.key2picture.nl/pages/fotografie-vak.php

Awesome Pictures. So pretty, I really like them.

Nice list, this really gives an extra effect to the photos.

Fantastic Photos, the highlighting of one colour really makes the difference

Even though not all of them are as great as some others, it is a nice list though.
My favourites being the one with the ladybug, the apple, the cards, the facepaint, the colour pencils, and the cooling towers.
Least favourite: the one with the drinks…

Omg this is so old! I puke on partially colored pictures! They’re all just so: “ohijustgotmyfirstdslrandnowimlearningphotoshop”.

A solid good picture doesn’t need the effect to look good!

im sorry this is just not a nice effect

Creative Photos. Very good list

@La Cinyc

You do, of course, have a valid point. And I was probably being a bit too harsh in my previous comment.

As You say, the effect should be used “at the right time”. The “problem” is that some people over-use it, so it becomes totally passé. So when it is used on a picture where it’s really called for, it will drown in the flood of all the other pictures with partial coloring.

I really don’t have any problem with sepia tints, since it’s something that is done evenly over the entire picture, like choosing between color or b/w, or like adjusting the contrast, brightness, e.t.c. Tone mapping on the other hand..*shudders* But again, sometimes it really looks good! But in 49 out of 50 pictures, it just looks plain bad, in my not so humble opinion

Why are people so cynical of others passions. Im sure the person that photographed these and worked on them was very proud, and with good reason. Why do all you jerks come in here and insult it for no reason? I dont understand. Dont you have anything better to do? Leave a nice compliment that says “wow these are pretty” or dont say anything at all. Theres so much negativity in this world. This was a tiny glimpse of the positive and you came and tried to ruin it. How sad you and your life must be.

awesome photography..loved it all