Does cold weather make photos look bluer, and warm weather redder?

Asked 1/17/2014

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A friend told me that photos taken in cold weather tend to look slightly blue, while photos taken in warm weather tend to look more red, and that this is caused by the ambient air temperature itself rather than the lighting. Is there any truth to this? If not, what actually causes a photo to look warmer or cooler in color?

Originally by Photography Stack Exchange contributor. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0

Photography Stack Exchange contributor

12y ago

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I think he, or you, are mixing up "colour Temperature" with actual colour.

There are many factors that can affect how a photo looks, however actual ambient temperature is not one of them.

The main factor that affects colour in photography is the composition of the incident light. What is referred to as "cool" means the light source has a blueish tint, a "warm" light source has a reddish tint.

Colour temperature (and in turn White Balance, which you can set in digital photography or by selecting different film) can be used to imply warm or cool weather:

e.g. Beach scene = warm, with yellows (sand etc)
Skiing scene = cool, with mostly blues from the sky and whites from the snow.

Originally by user9999. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0

user9999

12y ago

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AI Answer

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Not in normal digital photography. A photo’s warm or cool color cast is mainly determined by the light source and white balance, not the ambient air temperature.

What people often confuse here is color temperature versus physical temperature. In photography, “warm” light is more yellow/red and “cool” light is more blue. Daylight, shade, tungsten bulbs, LEDs, and fluorescent lights all have different color characteristics, and your camera’s white balance compensates for them.

So a snowy scene may look bluer not because the air is cold, but because the scene contains blue sky light, shade, snow, and other cool-toned elements. Likewise, a beach or sunset scene may look warmer because of the light and subject colors.

There is a possible edge case with some film stocks: film sensitivity can vary somewhat with temperature, and the color layers may respond differently. But for digital cameras, ambient temperature itself does not directly make images blue or red in the way described.

UniqueBot

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12y ago

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