'The Balance of Red & Blue': Color Symbolism in context of Fate & Free Will in Season Five

[zimshan]

So, apparently I’ve been out of school for too long and had the urge to write a paper? Who knows…

This thing got ridiculously massive very quickly, I blame it all on Serge Ladouceur for making me all thinky. I want my brain back, Serge

Comments

[annspal]

This is wonderful and I know I'll be linking to it when I work through how it fits with my view of the show. You've put together a thorough and logical examination that had me anticipating your conclusion. Stronger together!

The LICENSE PLATE. The two colors are built into the car Sam and Dean drive! Are you kidding me? [Yea, yea, I know, it’s the license plate for Kripke’s homestate, and has been there for years. Just work with me here.]

Man, when I was going through screen caps for 5.08 that shot of Impala-Sam caught my eye for the license plate too! It was striking enough that I actually checked against earlier shots (the Impala on the edge of the collapsed bridge in 5.02) to see if something about the plate had changed. (Nothing I could spot had.)



Did you notice the odd white and red circles within the blue star field of the flag in 5.08's police station? Any theories about that? It's almost like a bull's-eye target? I don't recognize it as any flag I've seen before and it seems an unexpected location for a stylized flag to show up.

Also, seeing the (oxoniensis) cap I just linked to has me wondering how much adjusting you did in clarifying and intensifying the colors in the shots you selected for this? While I'd become conscious of a lot of the red, white and blue (the background lights, ties, flags, etc.) the show has included, uses like the red in the salt bag by Jesse's mother barely registered for me. I'm not sure I'm even asking the right question to find out how much I'm regularly missing when watching the televised broadcast or when flipping through caps on my computer screen. Obviously, I have no skills or technical understanding so I welcomed the section discussing color and temperature in art and film.

Thanks for sharing all the hard work you've put into this. It's impressive!

[zimshan]

Oh, the flag in the back of the sheriff there is mostly likely the Ohio state slag (the circle is the Buckeye). It's been in a couple of episodes this season because we've had a lot of eps which have taken place in Ohio this year. At least two or three. I almost included those shots for the red and blue component they add to the shots but then reasoned it was more for practical story reasons that it existed.

has me wondering how much adjusting you did in clarifying and intensifying the colors in the shots you selected for this?
Ah, yes, I did clean up these caps a lot, mostly because I wanted to get the real color of everything as it stood in the shot before it was filtered through the camera. But AVI files of the episodes are also notoriously darker and drabber looking than what appears on television as well. I believe some contrast and saturation is lost in transfer. When you further play around with caps, resizing them and all, you lose alot more from them. For visual purposes, looking at all of these caps at like 1/16th their intended size, it'd be hard to see the red and blue in this post without some cleanup. 'Tis the nature of picspam. ;)

At any rate, I'm glad you found the post worthwhile! I sure had a lot of fun putting it together, so I'm glad to see people enjoying it!

[annspal]

Thanks! I wasn't familiar with the Ohio flag. Even though I hadn't spotted the show using it before, I am relieved to quit wondering about it now.

Good grief, 5x10 sure had me thinking of this entry! The show wasn't subtle about a flag this week, were they? Did the banker borrow his tie from Sam or from Dean, would you guess? *g*

I appreciate you talking a little about the difference in quality between what I see and what you are able to show us. I got in the habit of looking through screencaps back when I was watching the show on a snowy broadcast before the digital switch happened. I still haven't graduated to hi-def but most of the time no longer realize what I'm missing.

[zimshan]

That 5.10 flag was sure bizarre wasn't it? The 'Anti-God is Anti-American' made me go, HUH? What are you trying to SAY, Show??? But it was SO prominent, it felt definitely intentional somehow. But there was a good bit of red and blue outside of the flag that made me go HMMM too.

I appreciate you talking a little about the difference in quality between what I see and what you are able to show us. I got in the habit of looking through screencaps back when I was watching the show on a snowy broadcast before the digital switch happened.
Oh, no problem! I totally understand, this is actually the first year I've been able to watch on a real tv, so I had actually not realized how big of a difference there was between AVIs and HD broadcast myself until lately. My laptop doesn't have the best picture in the world so I've taken to watching tv with the saturation and contrast dialed way up the last couple years anyway.