**Help needed please, stuck on D&B**

[Ancientmovement]

Hi there everyone!

I really could use some help at the moment.

Last 2 weeks I went crazy on practicing dodge and burn.

And most of the time it just went smoothly, unfortunately when i started yesterday with my own photo's I shot I didn't manage to even fix a thing.

I really could some help on the part skin right under her eye. those pores are just so big. and I want to get rid of that highlighted part because it's just not flattering at all.

The problem is when i start to dodge and burn the dark and light parts. the difference of color between the two is goes too big to even fix.

The high lighted pores go in a very strange purplish color, and the dark pores go to a vague white/pinkish color when i burn them, even in the slightest way....

Could ANYONE please help me out on this problem .

I really have no clue how to d&b those huge pores under her eye and whatever I try it goes totally wrong...

[chillin]

Re: **Help needed please, stuck on D&B**

You could do a color shift correction after D&B.

[Ancientmovement]

Re: **Help needed please, stuck on D&B**

Woah , how can you do a color shift correction :O?

[chillin]

Re: **Help needed please, stuck on D&B**

Go here for a quick solution.

[Ancientmovement]

Re: **Help needed please, stuck on D&B**

thanks for the link, but I still can't manage to fix it

[spinq]

Re: **Help needed please, stuck on D&B**

Quick solution - Its not perfect but might help:
1) create empty layer
2) brush tool - blending mode: hue, sample the colour from the area you are satisfied with and paint over the area you're not.
3) blending mode to colour: dont sample - you already have the colour. again time to paint.

[edgework]

Re: **Help needed please, stuck on D&B**

Depending on how you're doing your D & B layer(s): if you use two curve layers, one to lighten and one to darken, make sure they're both in luminosity mode. If you use a Soft Light or Overlay layer, and paint in light and dark tones (my preferred method, but others find curves more effective), use white and black. That way you'll at least prevent hue drift. But you'll still have to account for the fact that saturation and hue will naturally vary with changes in the tonal range. D & B is really only meant to alter the lumonisity values. It won't be a problem if the shift is subtle, but shows up as the changes become more dramatic.

spinq's solution is a decent quick fix.

You might also consider using targeted curves. Sample the color values for the desired tone, and the area to be transformed. Plug the values into the Input and Output fields for each channel in your curve dialogue. Mask the layer and then paint white into the region to be shifted. This can effectively eliminate hue, saturation and luminosity problems in one step. Any imperfections can then be smoothed over with the healing brush.

[kav]

Re: **Help needed please, stuck on D&B**

You might also consider using targeted curves. Sample the color values for the desired tone, and the area to be transformed. Plug the values into the Input and Output fields for each channel in your curve dialogue. Mask the layer and then paint white into the region to be shifted. This can effectively eliminate hue, saturation and luminosity problems in one step. Any imperfections can then be smoothed over with the healing brush.

Hey that's how I do it when I use curves. It's normal for colors not to line up well, and it's too annoying to judge if it produces huge color shifts. I end up merging a lot of the smaller stuff though to a background copy and only keeping the broader adjustments in their original layers. Otherwise it can be too many layers to edit as opposed to masking off where things went a bit too far.

[ronfya]

Re: **Help needed please, stuck on D&B**

I deal with color shifts another way.

- duplicate original image to D&B
- fill the duplicate with 50% gray in color mode to get a B&W layer with only luminosity of the original
- set that B&W layer to luminosity blend mode (BM)
- create a new layer on top of everything (filled with 50% gray if you want, but not needed), set it to softlight BM and clip it to B&W layer
- D&B with white & black on that clipped layer

[ronfya]

Re: **Help needed please, stuck on D&B**

Actually, it's getting a little bit late here and I just gave the wrong version of the tip because if you want to keep any healing layer active & ready to use under the D&B layer, it's not convenient to have a complete layer on top of the original.

Soooo, if you have the original layer & a healing layer on top as a start, do something like this instead.

- create a "neutral" adjustment layer (levels or curves or hue/sat and do not change anything on it) on top and set it to luminosity BM
- on top of that, create a layer (filled with 50% if you want, but not needed), set it to softlight BM and clip it to the adjustment layer
- D&B with white & black on that very top layer

happy D&B

[kav]

Re: **Help needed please, stuck on D&B**

Just setting it to luminosity doesn't guarantee you anything. Sometimes colors are different hues. Even if they aren't it's still not perfect. Plan on making corrections or building them into the layer based on the surface you're retouching. If something works that is fine. If it's not working, change quickly. The burn/dodge aspect shouldn't require much practice in itself. It's how to apply things and address specific problems that should consume your practice hours.