Color Replacement problems-- Photoshop CS2

[Markzebra]

Hue/Saturation - choose reds or yellows. Then change the ranges of these carefully (easiest to do by holding Alt and shift and clicking within the window pane to add and subtract ranges of colour).

Another tip, especially useful with the Hue/Saturation dialog, is to hold the ALT key (or option) and use the scubby sliders, highlighting the word "Hue" and moving left and right- this will allow much subtler, easier to control shifts.

You can also sometimes get away with Selective Color highlighting Yellows, Reds, Magentas - this does nice subtle non destructive work.

Also set a curve to "Color" mode. Go into the Red and Blue channel curves particularly

[mayday]

Cheers Mark! do you tend to use a adjustment layer mask to target certain colour shift areas?
I guess you dont need to if you target in Hue and Sat?

[edgework]

Originally Posted by mayday

\Thanks edgework, What do you find to be the best method to equalize skin if its gone a bit off in some areas, I find sometimes after D&B you can get a colour shift

A good one-size fits all tweak (and I do mean tweak; not for major moves) is a Selective Color layer that pulls a little magenta and adds yellow to the reds, and pulls a little yellow and adds magenta to the yellows. Tends to balance the red/yellow problem, leaving a more even playing field for a normal curve enhancement.

D&B can definitely shift colors, either making a desaturated area too saturated, or the inverse, lightening a shadow area and finding that there's no color there (duh! it's a shadow!). That's why I don't use D&B for major moves. It's a fine-tuning step, where you mop up all the debris left over from your other moves.

One thing that I find always works (including stronger moves than I'd try with D&B) is to use a targeted curve on areas that need to shift, say larger regions of blotchiness that are too spread out and indistinct to respond well to cloning or healing. It works in reverse of how you usually use a curve for a color shift, which is to mask out the area, then apply the curve through the mask. In the case of uneven blotchiness, there's no way to create an initial mask. I set a color sample in an area of clean color (that I wish to match), then a second one in an area that needs to change. Then I add a curve adjustment layer and in each channel set a midpoint anchor. Plug in your input/output values from the two samplers. It's just a numbers thing, no thought necessary just input the bad, output the good. Now mask out the curve layer and start painting white where you wish to shift the tone. Use a low opacity brush, preferably a pressure-sensitive tablet, and let your eye tell you how to create the mask. The beauty of curves is that they distribute the shifts smoothly over the entire range, so you can hit areas that are lighter or darker than your samples and be reasonably assured that the tone will pull in the right direction. Of course, the accuracy diminishes the farther away you move from your samples, but you can always use a second curve for areas that are out of range of the first. The technique is the same as dodging and burning: small strokes, low opacity, use the 'X' key to switch back and forth from white to black.

Don't make the mistake of thinking you need to wrap up all the work from one approach before heading on to the next. In theory, you might start with bulk cloning, then healing to smooth things out, Dodge/Burn, some curves, etc; in truth, you keep moving back and forth. After each step, I find I need to create another layer to blend things with the healing brush, then I'll need another Dodge/Burn layer to even out some edges, then back to more healing brush, targeted curves, more healing, more D&B. Fixing one problem can leave you with a couple others you didn't notice earlier, and you have to keep your work flow flexible.

[Rob1960]

Thanks for everyone's help. I keep trying all the different proceedures suggested by each of you.

When I use a Lasso tool to select an area, is there a way to lock it? When I need to perform several different proceedures to an area, it's a pain to have to re-select it each time.

[rovis]

How come every other thread turns into a skin tread?

I usually desaturate the skin and bring back the color with curves.
do that on top of the d&b layers and the color shifting problems are mostly taken care of.

[mistermonday]

"When I use a Lasso tool to select an area, is there a way to lock it? When I need to perform several different proceedures to an area, it's a pain to have to re-select it each time."

Rob, after you have made the selection go to the Select Menu and choose Save Selection. Whenever you want the selection back go back to the Select Menu and choose Load Selection. You can name selections so that you can have multiple selections saved.
Regards, Murray

[Rob1960]

Originally Posted by mistermonday

"When I use a Lasso tool to select an area, is there a way to lock it? When I need to perform several different proceedures to an area, it's a pain to have to re-select it each time."

Rob, after you have made the selection go to the Select Menu and choose Save Selection. Whenever you want the selection back go back to the Select Menu and choose Load Selection. You can name selections so that you can have multiple selections saved.
Regards, Murray

THANK YOU! THANK YOU! I knew there had to be a way.

[Markzebra]

Mayday - yes generally I will try and produce colour adjustments without masks wherever I can.

Its important to understand that multiple adjustments, especially masked ones, are destructive. This is because Photoshop flattens each adjustment layer in sequence when the image is flattened for output, each time degrading the base pixels slightly. I've had to salvage too many files made by other people who chaotically pile 50 adjustment layers on an 8 bit image not realising how it can break the fine transitions apart, especially important on skin.

If I do need to use masks for colour, usually this happens where I need to do something really quickly, then I will produce proper graduated masks from the image data using Select Color Range or Calculations.