Orange may not be the most analysed film colour by researchers or critics, at least compared to the immense literature on red, black or blue, but it definitely belongs to the most featured colours of the cinematographic palette.
Without trying to be too exhaustive, here are some of the suggested reasons for the seeming prevalence of orange in movies:
Explosions, Skies, Skin Tones
Generally, the oranges are used to highlight explosions, bright skies and boost skin tones towards the hyper-real end whilst the contrasting blues (opposite orange on the colour wheel) exaggerate stormy skies/seas and help create mood and tension. (Daily Slandered blog )
Fire, Conflicts, Nature
Complementary colors can also reflect opposite concepts. In the case of orange and blue, the most common contrast is fire and ice; which can also easily relate to conflicts in action and adventure movies. Other opposing concepts that could be associated with oranges and blues are land and sea or natural and scientific. These are also great contrasts for action and adventure movies. (Colormetrix)
Depth
Another reason is that the combination of orange and teal creates depth. Instead of using sharp foreground and blurry background, you can add depth to the shot by combining these two colors. (DIYPhotography)
Humans
The big change that digitization made was it made it much easier to apply a single color scheme to a bunch of different scenes at once. The more of a movie you can make look good with a single scheme, the less work you have to do. Also, as filmmakers are bringing many different film formats together in a single movie, applying a uniform color scheme helps tie them together. One way to figure out what will look good is to figure out what the common denominator is in the majority of your scenes. And it turns out that actors are in most scenes. And actors are usually human. And humans are orange, at least sort of! (Priceonomics)
Not everyone is delighted to see the orange/teal or orange/blue trend. Some even call it annoyingly maddening.
Those of you who watch a lot of Hollywood movies may have noticed a certain trend that has consumed the industry in the last few years. It is one of the most insidious and heinous practices that has ever overwhelmed the industry. Am I talking about the lack of good scripts? Do I speak of the dependency of a few mega-blockbuster hits to save the studios each year, or of the endless sequels and television retreads? No, I am talking about something much more dangerous, much deadlier to the health of cinema.
I speak of course, of THE COLOR GRADING VIRUS THAT IS TEAL & ORANGE!!! (The Abyss Gazes)
Let us know in a comment what you think: does orange stand out more in recent films? Do you see that there is an orange / teal trend?
Featured image by Sheldon, a prolific quiz maker on Sporcle: Test your Orange Film poster score on the 50 Clickable Orange Posters quiz.
