before you can even begin to start working with color correction
you must have your monitor a calibrated if you don't understand what I'm on
about why it's important click the link below to the monitor calibration film
where everything be explained I'll tell you what kind of equipment you need
but in brief why it's important is the if your monitor
isn't displaying colors accurately how can you possibly
correct them accurately they might be OK on your monitor
but if you send them to someone else what are they gonna look like when they get there no
i know you can't guarantee
the someone else's monitors corrected but at least if your is
and someone comes back to you and says this picture is a funny color
you can with confidence tell them that is they monitor
not your image there two
branches to color correction as far as I'm concerned that is color accuracy
such as you would need for a product someone who's manufacture something a
chef is cook something
they want that to appear images as they made it so color accuracy is very very
important but then you also have what looks pleasing
because accurate may not necessarily look pleasing
let's have a look at accurate first so in my trusty
Photoshop here hereI've got an image which I shot from
electronics manufacturing company only last week you noticed is that down here in
the bottom left hand corner
is my trusty gray and white card which I
of them banging on about in films so why would I go such a stupid things to put
it in the photograph
well I know that this is white beyond any shadow of a doubt
so logic dictates that if I make what's in here
much what's in my hand then the colors in the rest to the picture
will be accurate clever thinking I
also the way I work I work in a controlled environment but I mean the
light in here is daylight balanced there are no tungsten bulbs which give you get
yellowy color cast
everything here is daylight balanced so therefore we are looking at my hand is
the correct color
if I a tungsten lights in here this would have a yellow we come across and I
would never in a million years
be able to get that to match that and have the colors
accurate the most important reason for using one of those would be if you're
using a role process in which I would generally do
for shoot of this type with the role processor you can take a little dropper
tool
clicking on to the white area of the card and then
that will correct that to white you have to be sure that you white really is a
genuine clean
white by spectrally accurate to do that but more on that in a different film
we're gonna do this longhand now I don't suppose for a moment you are working in
the same control environment
I am so this should be helpful to you at the very least
the place I would always begin is with the
auto adjustment so let's go auto color
run that in this case I think it's done a stunning job
if I flick between the two don't know if you can see this in the video because
subtleties of color hue sometimes get lost
when where compressing video for the web you can download these images so you can
compare the next to one another
and if you look at a picture which says that was the file name says has been
corrected
and you see it as having a funny color cast all looking wrong
your monitor needs calibrating okay
let's put this back to beginning
and do it the long way we go image adjustments
color balance now color balanced palate has got
the three little boxes which currently have zeros in them
they will change according to what you do
with these three sliders the sliders are for the three
main colors which you have when displaying an image well actually there
the three primary colors you have
when you're looking at an image red green and blue
and their opposites cyan magenta
and yellow e now this image has gotta believe green going on it
so what we need to do is to remove gray knit to do that I would push this middle
slider here away from green
and towards magenta and as I go so the greeny ast is coming out on hoping you
can see it that's about right
there good
looking below there we also have this tone balance area
this is it this this you can say here that you can want to work in shadow
areas
midtone in areas which we just have done and highlight areas
there's also this it'll take box which says preserve luminosity
this is very important always keep it ticked
are eyes perceive colors differently
to the way they actually are for example magenta is
often appear to be quite dark it makes a picture look dark if you add
magenta it isn't dark it's just the way
different light wavelengths I picked up by our eyes
by clicking preserved by keeping preserved luminosity ticked
Photoshop very very cleverly preserves that brightness
as you add and subtract different colors the it color balance right
this is one which works well so always keep it ticked mmm
okay we've worked in the mid tones we've got a much closer now looking at my card
id said it's still slight
subtle greeny is going on in there
and this certainly is across the top with a pinpoint machine here
so let's go into highlights take a little bit more green out which can
ease that across to Magento just looking at the pictures I do it
and this is going to be subtle hi my areas really do pick up color casts
so we want to be subtle with this 10 yeah it looks good to me
but now I've done this on have added a little bit if sort of pinkyness to
it
interestingly this dark area or the picture
doesn't look quite right to me it looks those covered little bit of pink in it
so im gonna click onto the shadow and radio button
I really something which might seem ludicrous only person greenback in
somehow around the highlight running down here
it's kinda picked up a little bit the pink so im gonna put a little
hint of greenback in
only in the shadow area the black area so it doesn't affect the bright bits
which will hopefully counteracted ya can see it you probably can see that in the
video
but that has pulled back black back to being black and the a
I it's a tiny amount but it is accurate
okay so this is looking to be the correct color now you're probably
thinking to yourselves is
okay mr smartass how you gonna get those settings on to another picture
which are shot at the same time and doesn't have
the card in it I for got to load the in to show you just now but nevermind
I we're gonna transcribe those settings
using the good old-fashioned longhand method
a pen and paper simple as that love low-tech stuff is
actually my favorites also way of going about anything
so I have to do is write shadows
plus 8 green click on the midtones button
read it off midss -31
green highlights
minus 10 green so now i got it on my notepad on just click
cancel outlive their this goes back to being green again
go and get the shot which doesn't have to card in it
image adjustments color balance
I'm gonna go today is to put those settings in there
so the shadows a class A green
push that across untill we get 8 in the box
97 made there we go many times
-31 green EU's and across their
3529 you know getting it
walks tricky and the highlights
hmm -10 green
so there we go I have just pushed across because in the second image
I shot in the identical light almost immediately I had taken the other image
with the card in it and if we put those side by side I think you'll be able to
see
there is a big difference in the colors
im gonna save this up as a copy so that you can have a look for yourself
but first ijust wanna show you how the software can get it wrong
through the pic try to get a wedding a pool cocktail what else would you
photograph a wedding for goodness sake
you can see is very very yellowy pink that's because
there was lots of tugsten light your headlights with tungsten mass that color
you get in the living room home in the Flash doesn't know all things go yellow
dont they
i like the light I didn't want to use a flash because it would make all
these
background really really dark possibly
but also I like the quality of the light but I don't like the color of the light
the two very different things let's just from the
auto adjustments auto color
mmm if I flick back and forth between the two
you can see it hasn't preserve luminosity
because a bit better but he's made it the dark
so there you go this is where the technology can always be relied upon
so we'll have to do this longhand
I made it very quickly because you kinda should have got the idea from
what I was doing just now the other image
this is obviously very very red were gonna pull out red at the end but
pushing in magenta
sorry into cyan and there's a yellow in this push in some blue that's
starting to look better already
the highlights they got lots of red and yellow in this so
again be a bit more subtle with the highlights just take that
down bit here and little bit of blue into then that's better
and the shadows to we aren't able to read to them
competitive low-end the
if I preview I think even in the video you can see an enormous difference in
that image
now I would probably fiddle with it a little bit longer than that trying to
absolutely accurate
but it's enough for you to see what I mean
finally ice wanna talk to you about pleasing because that's a very different
thing
accurate may not be pleasing this is a portrayal I shot and loosen any other
their wedding eleven years ago and last year I did the shortfall
when he asked me to do a tenth anniversary photo shoot
chosen this image yeah because it actually
fairly accurate in a scholar but it isn't pleasing
when you shoot in shade as I was there there's often a bit of a
Louis color cost going on and
you can counteract that will change the white balance settings in your camera
but he said easy to forget to do it when you caught up in the moment you're
saying right they see this web and in this way obey
you know come on share outlook human less stuff
those colors a fairly accurate if I run the also
adjustment watercolor conflict between
under even if you'll see that in the video to Liz it does improve it a bit
but even with the on the
Acura I still don't think that's particularly pleasing the and he looks a
bit blue looks like he just come back from the expedition to the North Pole
poor man
I'm so let's go into and let's make this pleasing
rather than accurate Covance
is exactly the same thing any now we're looking for what looks nice
but again don't forget if you doing this to someone else
you wanna make sure your mom this is the right color because you are a hiding to
no way
if it isn't
let's see other work in the meantime for someone to some reading their
so we gonna push the slide towards the rake it some rates going on nice warm
luxurious so to rate happening and I'm gonna put a bid
texan blowout put into the yen and make a stag and McConnell really
left it out if I do the pre here i think im the video you can see a change
straightaway gonna highlights and who did the same thing but more subtly with
the highlights
and with the shadows
that's looking much nicer
when I go with the preview I think in the video you can see that's gone from
quick hold
not very pleasing look too much warmer 1
but in this case the wall one is probably not accurate
but it does look nicer again I'll say this up for you in a moment
hmm taken have a look at it so they go little recap
you have accurate for products you then have pleasing
which works well for people and for landscapes and things like that
it might be delivered all day which is making things that blew off a lifeless
you can bring them to life but punching in a little bit a warm to the yellow and
overran the goalie sorta stuff going on in there
and finally don't forget to calibrate your monitor