This color correction business is giving me a BIG headache. Does anyone else feel like they spend more time reading than working :grin:

Below is an image I'm working on, the first being what I started w/, and the second where I'm at w/ it. How does my color look? Still a little blue? Need a touch of yellow? I mean, the corrected one doesn't really look blue until I add a touch of yellow to it, but, thats just what I see on my monitor. You could really start to drive yourself nuts..I've been trying to wrap my head around the whole numbers thing??? I got my KE book out and it said babies should have equal amounts of M & Y (like 15%) and no C or K. She's not really a baby though??

#1(cheek)-6,15,15,0
#2(nose)-9,14,16,0
#4(forehead)-20,29,25,0-should the Cyan be this high?
#3(white dress)-all 248 (RGB)

Are these acceptable numbers? I'm never quite sure where to sample from. For example, the white dress, in one spot all the RGB numbers match, but right next to it the blue(or other color) will be higher, it varies, even in areas that appear to be the same to my eye. So confused...

BTW it doesn't look like my samplers are showing up.

I had some fun with some new things I'm learning. Hope you don't mind.

After a global color correction, there was alot of cyan left in her face. I selected the cyan color with the color range tool. Then used curves to correct.

Details:

Made a loose selection of her face. Opened up color range, and with the eye dropper, selected the cyan patches.

I saved the selection as a channel, and ran a 3.5 blur on the channel. Then used the channel as a mask with curves.

I am interested to see how others correct this one.

For fun, I added a glow to the picture in one, and a glow plus lighting fx in another.

BTW, this is a nice looking picture. I like the focus, and pose. When I opened you pics up in photoshop, your targets were still there.

very nicely done, fats!

Craig

I agree, beautiful job. See what I mean, just when you think yours looks good...Did you work from the original or the processed one?

I like 2 & 3. Do you mind my asking how you added the glow?

I am not familiar w/ the color range tool, I guess I better check it out.
Mind sharing where you learned this technique? I would like to try it but think I will need more info.

What is considered a lot of cyan?

Thank You!

Kraellin and inskip,

Thank you so much. I am glad you like it.

See what I mean, just when you think yours looks good...

I know exactly what you mean. I can think of at least 5 people, on this forum alone, who make me feel like that all the time. :lol:

I really didn't think your pic looked so bad inskip. It was the cyan patches in her face, that was throwing off the skin color.

Alot of the time, a global color correction alone will fix the skin color as well. In this pic, I had to select the cyan, after a global correction, to make it look more realistic.

I was typing out the steps I took in detail, but I have ran out of time. I will be back from work in a few to finish this up.

Yes, my version is vastly improved over the original, but I still had a feeling it wasn't quite right. Your's looks perfect to me :pleased:
Did you work from the original?

I couldn't figure out how to get the cyan patches in the face once I was in color range tool. The whole image looks equally corrected, not just the face you selected???

Thanks for your reply, looking forward to hearing from you later on.

Ok, this might be a bit long, but I got on a roll. :dizzy:

I did work from the original.

Step 1:
Use a threshold adjustment layer to find the black and white points. Added color samples to each one to mark. After this, delete the threshold layer.

Step 2:
Add a levels adjustment layer, and set the black and white eye droppers to 13 black, and 246 white.
Now click on the black point you have marked with the black eye dropper, and click the white point with the white eye dropper. This color corrected the highlights, and shadows.

To color correct the midtones, I used the middle level sliders in each color channel, and adjusted by eye, until the picture looked right.

You could also find nutural grey, and use the grey eye dropper to correct the midtones. If there is no nutural grey in the image, you are going to have to do it by sight.

Tip:
After the global color correction, her skin still looked wrong. To much cyan. If you are wondering what are some correct numbers when dealing with skin tone, check out this skin tone chart.

http://retouchpro.com/pages/colors.html

Open up the chart in photoshop, and run your cursor over the skin colors to see what the cmyk values are. Notice how much lower cyan is than magenta, and how much lower magenta is than yellow.

I used to be a "by the numbers" guy, trying to get perfect numbers. That has now changed.

Sometimes I will get the skin looking good in my mind, but the numbers are not perfect. To me, if the numbers are not perfect, but it looks good to you, then keep it the way it is. I mostly just use the numbers as a guide. If the numbers are way off, then the skin color might not be possible, and it will look fake and unreal.

Step 3:
I added two color samples to her face. One on her cheek, and another on her forehead to monitor the colors. I set these color samples to cmyk readouts.

To fix the unreal looking skin, I used color range to select the reds.
Select - Color Range - click the down arrow, and select reds. If a warning pops up, don't worry. Just click ok, and the reds are still selected. With the reds still selected, add a curves adjustment layer, and photoshop will automaticly create a mask for curves.

I added some red to remove some cyan. Added some green to remove some magenta, and removed some blue to add some yellow. I did this untill the her face looked more real, and the colors on parts of her face were in correct number range.

While doing this, I noticed her face had some cyan patches in it. To fix these, I moved on to step 4.

Step 4:
To correct the cyan color patches, I made a loose selection around her face, and used the color range tool again. This time I used the eye dropper, and clicked on the cyan patches. I moved the fuzziness slider over till I have all the cyan color selected, but not the good color that remained in her face.

Click ok to make the selection, and then saved the selection as an alpha channel. I then used a 3.5 Gaussian blur to sofen the mask.

Still in channels, I clicked on the rgb channel, and then CTRL clicked on the alpha mask to select it.

I added another curves adjustment layer, which automaticly made a mask of the alpha channel I had selected. I then adjusted the red, green and blue again, to bring the cyan patches in range of real color, and to match the rest of the color in her face.

Step 5:
I am grouping the finishing touches into step 5.

I then added a curves adjustment layer. In the rgb curve, I moved up the 1/4, mid, and 3/4 tones, to bring out some light in the image, and in her face.

I merged all the layers to a layer on the top, and used the dodge tool to bring out some color in her eyes.

To add the glow effect, select the red channel. Click select, then all, then copy. Go back to the layers pallet, and make a new blank layer, then paste. Change the blending mode to luminosity, and drop the opacity down around 10 - 30%. Add some contrast with curves to the luminosity layer. Now blur the layer with a 10 - 20 pixel Gaussian blur. Add a mask to the layer, and paint back some details you want to keep like eyes, mouth, and some of her hair.

All of this takes some practice to get the hang of. To be honest, I am just now starting to catch on.

I hope this helps.

THANK YOU for such a thorough explanation, I really appreciate it.
I'm sure others will too.

The TIFF version is noisier than I'd like. If I were going to run NI where should I apply it in this workflow? I will probably use a mask w/ NI so that I don't soften the edges. The one thing I'm unclear on when it comes to masks is when I duplicate a masked layer it takes the mask w/ it, any new edits I make on this duplicate layer will be applied on top of the mask, correct? The mask wont hide the new edits will it?

For example, I run NI w/ a mask so that the filter won't soften the edges (esp the eyes). Now when I duplicate this layer to sharpen the eyes will the mask hide this edit or is it applied on top of it???

Just a couple of thoughts after reading the posts here. In evaluating the original the only true grey point is the white of the dress. The shadow from the couch is certainly dark but should it be made black? If the couch is grey then yes, if the couch is tan then no. It can make a big difference in that one way will give you an overall "cool" look, the other "warm".
I don't think Eismann says that babies and young children should have no cyan but that cyan values should be very low relative to yellow/magenta. Additionally, cyan is a natural component of shadow so higher levels on the shadow side of the child's face should not cause panic. My own feeling was that global correction works pretty good but you have to raise the yellow/magenta percentages which will reduce the cyan in relative terms. Anyhow, you can see that by not adjusting the shadows to black it might give you more of that warm, cuddly feeling.

Cheers
Dave

From what I can see in Eismann's book is that the fairest of baby skin is equal in Y & M w/ no C or K (0,15,15,0). But she doesn't necessarily fall into this category. It's been my observation that a young child like her should have equal amounts of M & Y w/ C being half (at most) or less.
I'm trying to learn how to go by the numbers because I don't trust my monitor or my own judgement yet. I tried to use the skin chart as a guide but not sure how-my numbers don't match up w/ those on the chart.

My image already looks much improved. But, I got stuck in the final stages. I was not able to see any cyan patches on her face??? Where am I supposed to see these? I was in color range. The fuzziness slider is grayed out as well. Did I miss a step???

I managed to get through the curves, but I'm never quite sure where to grab and drag on the curve line??? Thanks all...

I don't even know how to find a mid tone esp in a color image. Thanks for the tip Dave. I can see where that would be beneficial. But for some reason selecting that shadow appears more neutral and true to life. I may add warmth by toning it later on and/or convert it to B&W. I'm just trying to get a handle on this color correction business.

When selecting a particular color, in this case red, with the Color Range tool are any edits only effecting the reds in the image even though curves adjustments were made in the green and blue channels as well? Unclear on how this works :confused:

I read that a child of this age would probably have equal amounts of Y & M in her skin, what about areas that are rosier than others like cheeks?? Or should I stay away from those areas when sampling?

OK. So here's Eismann. 0,20,2o,0. Well, ok, 1, 20, 20, 0. Based strictly on skin tone (no balancing of highlights or shadows) does this work? Only a question based on the book. Again, was the couch grey or biege? Different parts seem to have elements of both.
In closing, give 10 people who think they know how to color correct and you'll probably get 10 different renditions. Color correction by the numbers gets you into the ball park. After that, you're really on your own.

Cheers

Dave

Color correction by the numbers gets you into the ball park. After that, you're really on your own. i think that's a very good way to look at it, duv.

btw, love what you did with that pic!

Craig

I like what you did there Duv.

That is a good point with global color correction.

I am still learning about color correction, and alot of times I start out with the basics to get where I want with an image. I use the black and white eye droppers alot, and as you mentioned, that may not always be the best approach.

Well, I’m no expert and from what I’ve read I would say I’m at a similar level to inskip so I can’t contribute much here.

What I did want to do was thank fatOn3s for an excellent insight into how you tackled this picture

It seems that the setting of a black and white point in this picture has introduced a cast that has made the picture worse.

Is there any way to tell if a picture SHOULD HAVE a true black or white point?


Ken

It seems that the setting of a black and white point in this picture has introduced a cast that has made the picture worse.
Ken

I actually think it worked in this case. fatOn3s rendition seems more true to the scene as it appeared when I took the photograph. BTW the chair IS beige and ivory.

Ken-The only way I know of to find the B & W points is w/ a Threshold Adj. layer by moving the slider all the way left or right and then slowly dragging it back will show the lightest/darkest points in the image. What I don't know, is how to find the mid-tone in a color image.

I just want to use the numbers as a guide because I don't trust my eye or my monitor yet. I tried to use the skin chart but my numbers didn't really match up-not sure how to use it.

I'm attaching part of a previous post because I 'm still curious about the answer.

When selecting a particular color, in this case red, with the Color Range tool are any edits only effecting the reds in the image even though curves adjustments were made in the green and blue channels as well? Unclear on how this works

I read that a child of this age would probably have equal amounts of Y & M in her skin, what about areas that are rosier than others like cheeks?? Or should I stay away from those areas when sampling?

The only way I know of to find the B & W points is w/ a Threshold Adj

Yes. This is the way I do it. But it still does not tell you if these points should be black and white.


When selecting a particular color, in this case red, with the Color Range tool are any edits only effecting the reds in the image even though curves adjustments were made in the green and blue channels

What this means is that he has only selected the reds but once selected these areas can be changed any way you want. ie Adjust the green in the reds.


what about areas that are rosier than others like cheeks

I would treat rosy cheeks like make-up and highlights and avoid them as
they are not the real skin tone.


I liked Duvs 'warm, cuddly feeling' although fatOn3s rendition may have been closer.

Ken

If you have true black, white, and grey points in an image, you can color correct it almost perfect.

The problem is knowing if something is really black white or grey.

Looking at the couch, I figured it was a shade of grey, when judging the color of the overall picture. Turns out, I was wrong.

Alot of times, if colors in a picture are not true to life, it dosen't really matter, as long as memory colors are correct. Memory colors meaning colors that you know by memory.

If you have a picture with orange grass, and blue grapes, anyone who looks at that picture will know it's not true to life. I know that might be an extreme example, but the same thing holds true to skin color.

If you have a picture with a person's skin looking to blue or green, anyone will think that the color is wrong in the entire picture.

On the other hand, if you have the skin color correct, but the person's t-shirt is white when it's supposed to be a light blue, I don't think anyone will notice.

I assume pros can get the color of the entire picture true to life, but I'm not at that level yet.

If you take your own pictures, invest in a color chart. Having a color chart in the picture, will take all of the guessing out of what's black, white, and nutural.

Not sure what the deal is w/ Color Range, but when I select cyan nothing show up in the selection mask preview except her eyes which I don't want to change. However, I can see that cyan is high in certain areas of her face??? This bothers me because in Eismann's book it says wherever the mask is black no correction will take place, well the whole mask is black. Also, it won't let me select the Color Range eyedroppers and the fuzziness slider is grayed out.

I really need to get the WB straightened out on my camera... :dizzy:

Inskip, I think changes are being made even though the mask looks black. You also have to make sure that you Deselect, otherwise, you could be trying to sharpen your whole image when in fact your only sharpening the "selected" color in Color Range.
Some Cyan in a child's face is natural if some parts are in shadow. I think for a child you want to sample the lightest area (assuming it's not blown out). Even if you balance the light area to 0 cyan, you may still have some cyan in the shadows which again I think is natural.
Threshold does "not" give you black and white points. It only gives you the lightest and darkest areas which is totally different.
The more information a retoucher is given the better and closer he/she can come to an accurate rendition. Knowing things like the couch is biege and ivory as opposed to grey and white can help a lot.
Pictures are about feelings. If color correction gives you the feeling you want..you're there. Don't forget also that the type of light that is falling on the scene can be important such as late evening sun which can make a wonderful "color cast" picture. Just some ramblings.

Cheers
Dave

Thanks fatOn3s for another excellent post. I think I’ll print that out.

If you have true black??

And from Duv

Threshold does "not" give you black and white points. It only gives you the lightest and darkest areas which is totally different.

This is my point. How can you tell?
I found this in a workflow from luminous-landscape

Check for “true black”; open blue channel; move shadow slider right to beginning of graph; if histogram stops short of 8, there is no true black so eyedropper cannot be used (skip step); if values under 8, click Set Black Point eyedropper (left most).

Does this make sense?
Is there a better way of finding if there is a true black or true white?

Ken

Thanks fatOn3s for another excellent post. I think I’ll print that out.

??

And from Duv



This is my point. How can you tell?
I found this in a workflow from luminous-landscape

Check for “true black”; open blue channel; move shadow slider right to beginning of graph; if histogram stops short of 8, there is no true black so eyedropper cannot be used (skip step); if values under 8, click Set Black Point eyedropper (left most).

Does this make sense?
Is there a better way of finding if there is a true black or true white?

Ken


Ken, "True" is a state of mind. It doesn't exist. The best photographer in the world when inspecting his/her work in PS will find contamination. That's because, seldom in life do we experience pure aka true blacks and whites in our works. It's a self imposed state that we impose upon ourselves to get the image to a neutral point.."even though the correct image is off the neutral point". That probably doesn't make sense but what I'm trying to say is that you control reality. How well you do that results in the final image. If you took a picture of a "blue black" dark person, would you change the values to say 30,30,30? You've certainly elimanated the color "cast", you may even have a picture you're more happy with, but is it correct, right, whatever? You're the judge. Does it please you? Does it please others that view it? There is no magic formula. Only suggestions that help to guide and make you think about what you are doing. There is no panacea..only continued effort and understanding. Perhaps that last double scotch was ill advised.

Dave

Not sure what the deal is w/ Color Range, but when I select cyan nothing show up in the selection mask preview except her eyes which I don't want to change. However, I can see that cyan is high in certain areas of her face??? This bothers me because in Eismann's book it says wherever the mask is black no correction will take place, well the whole mask is black. Also, it won't let me select the Color Range eyedroppers and the fuzziness slider is grayed out.

I really need to get the WB straightened out on my camera... :dizzy:


Maybe these pics will clear things up.

Pic 1 shows how I selected the cyan color in her face.
Pic 2 shows the alpha mask I created from the selection in color range. I blured the mask with a 3.5 gaussian blur.

As you can see, I am not actually selecting the cyans from the drop down menu. I am manually picking them with my eye dropper as shown in pic 1. Then I moved the fuzziness slider over, till it looked like I had all of the bad color in her face selected. I also switched to quick mask mode, in color range, in see what parts of her face was actually selected.

To be honest, this might not be the best way to select the cyan patches in her face, but it was the solution I came up with.

I hope this is what you were asking for.

How in the world can you tell that you're actually selecting cyan from that as opposed to some other color? My eye isn't that well trained yet :ditsy:

Are you using the Color range Eyedropper in the actual image and when you get to a spot that is high in cyan sampling it?

Sorry...??

Thanks for your comments Cameraken.

inskip,

I can see the parts of her skin that has to much cyan, and I think you can too, even though you don't think you can. :tongue:

The reason I say this is because when you looked at the original, you knew that something looked wrong in it. You didn't know what, but you knew there was something not right.

When you are not sure what it is wrong, and alot of times I don't, that's where the info pallet comes into play.

When in the color range tool, you could use the info pallet to help judge what is good skin color, and what color is bad. When you see skin that has a high level of cyan in it, select it with the eye dropper.

Keep in mind though, not all pictures will require going through all of this to get skin color correct. Alot of times, removing just a color cast with also correct skin color.

Remember Duv's tips.

One person's idea of correct color, maybe different than another person's idea. Who's to say my picture is correct in color, and Duv's is not. Duv's picture, and my picture, are both correct and incorrect at the same time. Correct color is in the eye of the beholder.

BTW, also make sure that your monitor is calibrated. I just use adobe gamma to calibrate my monitor. It comes with photoshop, if you have a PC, and you can find it in your control pannel. If you have a mac, I think you have to use a different program to calibrate, but I could be wrong.

With a calibrated monitor, you can trust the color you see on your screen much more.

One thing I've learned from all this, is I sure like to ramble. :tongue:

Anyways, I hope this helps.

fatOn3s, your ramblings are all good :)

Well, when I ZOOM in I can now see the clumps of cyan in her skin. But w/ the Color Range tool I'm not sure how I will know that I'm actually picking the cyan because it doesn't show/tell you that are. It just shows a mask of her face. Anyway, I will dig into my books and play w/ it some more so I can get a better understanding of this tool.

I get how "correct color" is relative. For me, I generally (but not always) go neutral-not too warm, not too cool. I can always add effects like that later on. Thanks.