How can I increase color saturation naturally?

Question

I just went to a gallery where the photographer had incredibly colorful/saturated photos. Along with them was a sign "unaltered" which I assume means HDR was not used. This appeared to be a medium or large format film camera, and I'm wondering what the photographer might have done to make his photos so vibrant?

Are there tricks landscape photographers normally use aside from HDR to add color?

Answer 1

There's really no such thing as an "unaltered" photograph.

Unless you're going to pin a piece of undeveloped film to the wall. Certain film stock is designed to give exaggerated colours and there are film processing techniques (e.g. cross processing) to do the same.

A digital camera cannot detect colour directly, only intensity. Sensors have a mosaic of different coloured filters placed over the pixels to allow colour information to be inferred. Therefore "alteration" by demosaicing is absolutely necessary in order to generate a colour image. Colour saturation is simply a parameter of this process so the photographer is free to set as they please. And then go on to claim the image is "unaltered" as it hasn't been through Photoshop...

There are things you can do at capture time to increase the saturation, for example using a polarizing or graduated ND filter, being careful not to overexpose, avoiding lens flare, choosing your subject carefully, shooting when atmospheric conditions are at their best. But just don't be lead to believe that "unaltered" actually means anything.

Answer 2

As you think it was a film shot, and imply it was a landscape, then I will have to assume:

1 - The film choice is all important - some are VERY saturated, some are very pale.

2 - The photo paper (assuming it was old-school optical paper and enlarger) also has a bearing on the saturation of the print.

3 - when shot, the photographer probably used an ND Grad filter to bring down the sky brightness, in effect this is the original "HDR" method.

Answer 3

For a start, certain films turn out more vibrant than others. Using DSLR's like the 5D lets you increase colour saturation/contrast/vividness etc all while the photo is being taken so 'unaltered' may still apply in this way. In addition you can also use filters to enhance the colours of shots in different ways.

Hope that helps!

Answer 4

One way to get more blue in the sky is to underexpose. Overexposure tends to go to white. Bracket your shots downward and see which comes out best. Or take a wide bracket of shots of plain sky in manual settings, and see which blue you like. Then start with that setting and work from there.

Answer 5

Back in the days when I used to shoot film, shooting original Velvia 50, rating it at ISO32 and printing on Cibachrome was the landscape photographer's staple for the high contrast, high saturation look. Check out the work of Joe Cornish or Jack DyKinga; some of the best proponents of Velvia 50.