The Georgia Tech – North Carolina game that I went to this weekend quickly turned sour for the Jackets and I began to turn to other ways to amuse myself while the Tarheels had the ball, which was frequently. I turned to a philosophical question that had bugged me since I pulled into a parking lot full of people dressed in every variation of light blue regalia: Did God so love North Carolina that he made the sky Carolina Blue.
While a casual scoping out of the stands on this cloudless afternoon sure made it seem so, I decided I needed some photographic evidence to examine. For example, this photo of the east stands has a beautiful gradiant colored sky that would let you pick about any shade of blue you wanted.
Part of this effect is due to the polarizing filter I had on my normal lens that really makes the sky “pop” out under the right conditions. For example, the sky in the background of this picture of GT Pep Band (my son is completely obscured, so no use trying to spot him) is so dark it looks like a storm is brewing. And this one is even darker.
One of the Photoshop Elements features that I have become enamored with is the photostitch function that makes panoramas from groups of pictures. Here is my wide angle double picture of the stadium.
I did my best to keep the exposures exactly the same but there is still a fringe of tone change in the sky right where the two pictures overlap. The picture on the left was at 1/200 second and the one on the right was 1/250 second and you wouldn't think it makes that much difference but it does. I’m sure someone with madder skilz than me could blur and sponge and gradient that right out, but it still shows that the shade of the sky is rather subjective.
To better isolate the colors, I switched to my telephoto lens and took the filter off. Here is a close-up of the flag flying at the north end of the stadium. As you can see, the foliage on this fine Fall day was just blazing with color of its own. 
Thanks to the miracle of Photoshop, I can take that flag out of the trees and put it right against the sky. And while I hate to give credit to a rival ACC team, I have to admit to the fidelity of that particular shade of light blue. If the sky isn’t Carolina Blue, then it ought to be.
BlatantCommentWhoring™: What color is the sky in your world?
8 comments:
Red and black.
Purple. OK, not really but that would be totally cool. The sky on the other side of the world is, well, blue. Pretty blue, although it's raining at the moment so it's cloudy and gray-ish.
As per our Chicago neighbors to the south, Wilco, it is a "sky blue sky." Except right now, at 10:45, when it is an inky murk with clouds sort of cream-in-your-coffee under a very dim lightbulb.
This is the dark time up here in Alaska, so I guess our sky is black.
No, no, no. God is not a Tarheels fan. He is a UCLA Bruins fan. We know this, because not only is the sky blue, but the sun is yellow.
Even in this Tarheel house, we acknowledge that the Clemson fans point out that God also put Chapel Hill in Orange County.
When I heard "Carolina blue", I imagined it was sky blue - but it turns out it is powder blue or baby blue - lighter than what I would call sky blue. Or maybe that's because I'm used to the Seattle sky, which is deep blue - when it's not gray.
mostlylurking
Carolina blue, baby blue and sky blue are all very similar shades. We don't get that humidity free super deep blue here on the East Coast.
And nobody has gone for Bad Company's "Give me silver, blue and gold The color of the sky, I'm told."
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