Retouching old photo

[garfield]

HI! this is an old photo taken last 3 years and i need help on how or what steps i need to do to get off the red thing i dont know what its called is it color cast? i dont know really. also im sorry if the image is not very clear. Thanks!

[CJ Swartz]

Woof! Okay, I'll be the first guinea pig, and I expect someone to come along and show an "easy way" to make it look much better.

Using Color Range to select the color cast, I used a combination of Hue/Saturation and Selective Color to reduce the unwanted hues, then Levels to help the overall image, and a Layer Mask to bring back some of the color to the people. I've tried numerous strategies, so I'll be happy to see a better way as I continue to try to fix this.

[tyeise]

Hi Garfield,

I use Paint Shop Pro - but the same thing should be able to be done in most good graphics programs.

I started by separating the channels. The red channel was the most evenly colored as far as lights and darks, so I pasted that back into the original image as a new layer and set the blend mode for luminance.

Then I added another layer and set the blend mode for color, and just selected colors from the top half of the image, and colored them in on the lower half. I only spent about 20 minutes on it. You could get much more detailed on the colors by taking a bit more time.

Tyeise

[CJ Swartz]

Good job, Tyeise!!

I saw that the Red channel was the only clean one (looked at the CMYK and LAB channels), but didn't want to paint (since I'm not a painter). Your version works better than my strategy, and I could probably paint in the colors... given some time and a little patience.

[KenB]

Tyeise, I tried this one and I never come close to anything I'd care to let anyone see. You really did a great job on this one and I copied your instrucyions down for future use. Thanks for the info.


Ken

[garfield]

thanks for repairing some of the image hue in the image. Thanks a lot ill follow what you all said. thanks i learned something again!

[angue]

WOW!
Tyeise,
It translates very well in PS 7. Now I just need to save this tip where I can easily find it when I need it.

Tony

[tyeise]

Thanks everyone for all your wonderful comments. I'll admit it was fun trying to find a solution for this that everyone could do.

Tyeise

[jeaniesa]

Holy cow! Great solution Tyeise! This will definitely come in handy for me.

Thanks,
Jeanie

[roger_ele]

tyiese - great idea, red for luminosity

I did what you suggested, but first I duplicated the background layer, and set it to screen mode to lighten, then masked off the top section, flattened, then used the red layer for luminosity, then I color corrected the bottom and used selective color, working my way in to the bright red corner, then colored and adjusted brightness.

Roger

[CJ Swartz]

Roger, to my eye, you completely eliminated the demarcation line between the two areas in the waterfall -- Excellent work!

I'm attempting to duplicate your strategy, but I'm having trouble masking out parts of that line.

[Sanda]

Tyeise
Great technique. I just tried it out myself and it worked like a charm. I can't wait to try it out on some problem photos I have.

Roger you did a great job. As CJ said you combined the two areas perfectly. I've been playing with the photo as well but as yet don't have it as good as yours.

[tyeise]

Roger - you did a wonderful job! I wouldn't have known the image ever had a midline problem!

Tyeise

[roger_ele]

Thanks,

CJ - It was just general masking / corrections (I had a dark line running horizontally through all of the correcting), then cloned in color mode and normal mode once the color was balanced to remove the horizontal line, then vertical brush strokes on the watefall of white & black on an overlay layer until the water "popped".

Roger

[CJ Swartz]

Roger -- ahh! Cloning!

(...and I thought you'd figured a method that didn't need it. )
Thanks!