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While that's artistically correct of course, it's not usually culturally applicable except where the photographer is deemed an absolute artist :)

 

IOW, what the photographer might find artistically pleasing is not necessarily what the client will.

 

So it's easy enough to be subjective and declare a fondness for cynotic or green faces; convincing a client that's a realistic or flattering depiction is another thing entirely :)

The problem is, that the perception is different in different cultures. There are differences between th USA and Europe and between both of them and Japan for instance. It is a matter of the light and colours our eyes are habituated to.

It is well known that renaissance paintings of Italy were deemed "unrealistic" for their colours. Until people started travelling to Tuscany.

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The problem is, that the perception is different in different cultures. There are differences between th USA and Europe and between both of them and Japan for instance. It is a matter of the light and colours our eyes are habituated to.

It is well known that renaissance paintings of Italy were deemed "unrealistic" for their colours. Until people started travelling to Tuscany.

 

And that's exactly what I was saying in my post: culture makes convention for representation, not the photographer's whim (unless of course the photographer doesn't care or is an undisputed "artist") :)

 

Still, Jaap, NA and Europe share one set of photographic conventions for skin tones for the world (pretty much where yellow is always greater than magenta and magenta is greater than cyan), even though the actual ratios might be relatively different from place to place or from ethnicity to ethnicity--which is also what I said previously: many fashion photographers in particular from Northern Europe prefer more cyan than I'd put in a well-lit Caucasian skin tone..

 

Personally, I don't think it has anything to do with quality of light as much as how culture views itself (though I don't doubt there are different qualities of light, BTW).

 

For example, I have often seen requests from the south-east asian community--even here in Canada--to lighten skin tones into a range most people would find very bright indeed (and that goes for many ethnic Chinese as well).

 

It's not wrong--but it is different, and it's certainly not colorimetrically accurate or even the way the camera "sees" things (which is usually flawed in different ways).

 

Even so, I've never known of a cultural convention that puts more green than magenta or more cyan than yellow in people's skin--any people's skin. We're talking subtleties here--not broad strokes.

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Actually, although I have no photographic examples, Finnish skin is quite blueish in my perception. That would account for your observation about Northern Europe. Maybe somebody from Scandinavia could comment?

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Actually, although I have no photographic examples, Finnish skin is quite blueish in my perception. That would account for your observation about Northern Europe. Maybe somebody from Scandinavia could comment?

 

Interesting--I have met a few Finnish people, and I wouldn't say their skin is overly blue (and certainly not cyan, which is usually an indication of illness). It's more of a fashion statement than an actual one--many fahsion photogs prefer a desaturated bluish skin tone for visual effect ;)

 

I should add as well that for fashion photography magazines will print too warm as well for effect.

 

Though you can't tell much from the web (there are so many ways the colour can get truly messed up!), do a Google image search and look at professional pix of people (not uncorrected snaps or blog posts) and you'll see they generally follow the "more yellow than magenta more magenta than cyan" rule.

 

http://english.people.com.cn/200509/04/images/finland2.jpg

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