Gels

For something so simple and inexpensive, a pack of multicolored gels can really give your images a whole new funky edge. A splash of bright color can change the mood of your photos and is used by editorial and commercial photographers to take some highly creative images.

A gel is simply a colored piece of acetate that is fastened in front of the light source so that the light output takes on the color of the gel. Gels initially were thought of as highly technical bits of kit, designed for color correction when you were trying to accurately balance light sources of different color temperature—a crucial step in the days of transparency film where you couldn’t adjust white balance on a computer. Gels have also been used to change light sources ...

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