Realism vs Expressionism

[Overread]

Photoshop is mostly the top though there are other options. In general full editing software suits are not that common, but there's a range of niche software options for things like sharpening; noise reduction; HDR; etc... that are often used as bolt-on-extras (many even interface with photoshop).

That said there are options like GIMP and Mac's have their own software brand option; but yes Photoshop does rather rule the roost

 

[Watchful]

To see how the eye does white balance, go out and face the sun on a cloudless day. Close your eyes and cover one eye with your palm. Wait a minute and turn around, open your eyes and look at the ground where your shadow is. Look with just one eye at a time and compare images. The sun eye sees blue shifted whites and the covered eye sees red shifted whites as they both try to compensate for the recent input.

 

[Overread]

Sometimes you can even see subtle shifts in colour balance just by using one eye then the other.

 

[Tim Tucker]

To see how the eye does white balance, go out and face the sun on a cloudless day. Close your eyes and cover one eye with your palm. Wait a minute and turn around, open your eyes and look at the ground where your shadow is. Look with just one eye at a time and compare images. The sun eye sees blue shifted whites and the covered eye sees red shifted whites as they both try to compensate for the recent input.

Kids, don't try this at home! I wouldn't advise anybody to look towards the sun on a cloudless day if you want to carry on seeing anything at all.

However if you looked through a window at the blue sky on a cloudless day for a few seconds and then looked away and blinked... You would see the image of the sky in the window, but in orange. It's called Successive Contrast (Afterimage) and works with bright colours by exhausting the receptors in the eye thereby creating a immediate shift in colour balance (it's important to remember that your eye sees continually and builds up an ever adapting mental picture over a period of present time and does not see in a succession of stills as a movie camera does).
This, however is the same process that drives Simultaneous Contrast, a process that's almost an auto white balance. Your eye likes to see colour in balance, it likes all the primaries present in some form and actively adds them or compensates towards them when they're not there.

 

[Watchful]

You face the sun with closed eyes.
Closing your eyes is key here.

 

[Tim Tucker]

You face the sun with closed eyes.
Closing your eyes is key here.

This is true, and though the semantics are neither here nor there I think you did say:

...go out and face the sun on a cloudless day. Close your eyes and cover one eye with your palm.

But more than that, I'm not sure that it will produce the results or conclusions you anticipate. If you look towards the midday sun (with eyes closed) what exactly are you looking at? Is it balanced sunlight or the effect of your eyelid as a filter that produces the blue-shift? It's not really a clear example, whereas the blue sky is dominated by a narrow range of hues and the effect is easier to see and understand, you can see the shape of the window clearly in orange.

 

[xenskhe]

How is this 'principal photography'? Do you mean this is scouting-out the location? What it's to convey depends on what the film is about I would say.

[Principal photography is the phase of film production in which the movie is filmed, with actors on set and cameras rolling]
Principal photography - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[s.smith]

This is exquisite! Absolutely beautiful. Thanks for sharing it.