Let me show you how to apply a cinematic color grade to your photos in Photoshop.
Even though this tutorial is
for beginners, I will show you advanced techniques that I'm sure you'll love.
I'll go slow and explain everything
in small, digestible chunks so that you understand the process.
This Color Grading Photoshop Tutorial is
part of my Hands-on tutorial series inside of Photoshop,
I created ten tutorials that appear inside of Photoshop 2021.
That's Photoshop version 22.5 and newer.
This means that you can open the asset files for this tutorial directly
from Photoshop and follow along with Coach marks showing you each step.
To open this tutorial in Photoshop, go into the Discover panel.
You can bring it up by clicking
on the Discover icon or by pressing CTRL F on Windows, that's Command F on the Mac.
From the Discover panel, click on Hands-on Tutorials,
then scroll down until you find this
tutorial, or you can search for it by name.
Simply type" "create a cinematic look" in the search bar.
When you find the tutorial,
click on it to select it, and then click on the blue "Start Tutorial" button.
This will load up the tutorial assets and you'll see the blue onscreen coach
marks indicating you what to do for each step of the tutorial.
And no worries. If you don't have the latest version
of Photoshop, you can still follow along with older versions.
You can download the tutorial files from my website.
The link is below in the description.
The look that we're going for in this tutorial, is the blue/orange color
combination that you often see in Summer Blockbusters.
This look has Blues on the shadows
and background that contrasts well with the skin tones.
This color combination is used because
skin tones are found in the Reds, oranges, and yellows and the complementary colors.
The colors opposite in the color wheel are the Blues and cyans,
and when you place complementary color side by side, they pop.
In this case, making the main subject pop and stand out.
To create this color grade,
go into the new Adjustment Layer icon and choose Selective Color.
This adjustment layer allows you to add colors to other colors or tones.
From the Properties panel, make sure that the Absolute button is enabled.
Then from the colors dropdown, Select Neutrals.
Using the slider you can subtract or add a color.
Drag the Cyan slider to the right to about 10% to add Cyan to the midtones.
Dragging a slider to the left will give you the opposite color.
Subtracting Cyan will give you red.
Subtracting Magenta will give you green.
And subtracting yellow will give you blue.
In this case, you can drag the yellow
slider to about -10 to add blue to the midtones.
If you forget the relationship between
these colors, you can create a Color Balance Adjustment
layer and you'll see this color relationship with the sliders.
I don't need this adjustment layer,
so I'll delete it by dragging it into the trash icon.
If your image looks flat,
you can add more contrast by dragging the black slider to the right to about 5%.
The Cyan and Blues that you added
to the neutrals will also affect the skin tones, making them look unnatural.
You can counterbalance this effect
by reducing Cyan and blue from the skin tones.
No matter the ethnicity, you can find skin tones in the Reds and yellows.
Select Reds from the color drop, then set the Science slider to about
negative ten and the yellow slider to about ten.
Doing so will reduce the Cyan and blue effect added to the skin tones.
To further remove the blue tint from the skin tones,
go into the Colors dropdown
and Select Yellows and drag the Cyan slider to about -15.
Then you can add a bit of magenta to create more natural skin tones.
About 5% should work.
No need to add yellow in this case.
Of course, feel free to experiment
with these sliders to get the results that you want.
If you still want more contrast in your image,
you can go into the Colors menu and choose Blacks.
Then drag the black slider to about 5%.
To finish the cinematic color grading effect
you can make the colors in this image pop by increasing the Saturation.
Click on the new Adjustment Layer icon and Select Vibrance.
Then set the Vibrance to about 50.
Vibrance just like Saturation increases the Saturation in your image,
but Vibrance does it in a smarter way.
It protects skin tones and targets less saturated colors.
And here's a cool trick for you,
Hover over the eye icon next to the original layer
and hold Alt on Windows, that's Option on the Mac and click.
This will hide all the layers so that you can only see the original image.
And repeat this process to bring back the hidden layers.
Hold Alt on Windows that's option on the Mac and click.
If you enjoy this technique, hit that Like button now
and let me know in the comments below
what you thought about this in-app Photoshop tutorial.
Also, remember to go into Photoshop
and check out all my other In-app tutorials in the Discover panel.
You'll see my name Jesus Ramirez next to all my tutorials inside a Photoshop.
You can also look below in the description for a playlist
with all my videos about the In-app tutorials
and make sure that you check out my Photoshop in-app Tutorial
on adding a dual lighting effect to a portrait.
You can watch it here.
Thanks so much for watching.
I'll talk to you soon.