jero32 said:
edit2: even more evidence of this in empire strikes back, it had a lot of orange and blue lighting in the carbonite freezing room. This seemed to me to be actual lighting vs photochemical enhancement.
You will find Blue and Orange contast in a lot of film lighting, the main reason being that film is sold in daylight and tungsten stocks. Not all light colors are the same, light bulbs are orange and daylight is blue (and florescent lights are green). Our eyes adjust to the difference in kelvin temperature, but not film stock.
Use daylight film indoors, and you will get an orange image if your lights are not gelled to adjust for the difference in light temperature.
Use tungsten film outdoors and everything becomes blue.
If you are shooting a film or tv show on the quick you WILL have a collection of tugnsten/daylight gels to make quick adjustments. Cinematographers just found out that having that blue/orange contrast was easy to do and makes for a "popping" image.
I know people complain about the whole teal obsession and I agree it's been a bit overdone, but cinematographers since the silent era have known that contasts create a very pleasing image. From the low-key black and white cinematography of German expressionism and American film-noir, to the rich contrasty colors of technicolor and beyond.
Let's just say that I don't see people missing the days of the low-contrasty, diffused look that plagued film cinematography of the 70s. *coughmccabe&mrsmillercough*