In this video, I'm going to show you how to easily apply color tone in Photoshop.
Hi, Jesus Ramirez here from the Photoshop Training Channel.
In this video, I'm going to show you how to quickly and easily apply a color tone to a photo.
We're going to focus on the teal, orange cinematic effect, but with the techniques that you will
learn in this video, you can apply any other color combination that you like.
Okay, let's get started.
We're going to work on this image here, of this woman riding a motorcycle.
To apply the cinematic color effect or any other color tone that we want, we're going
to use the selective color adjustment layer.
I really like this adjustment layer because this adjustment layer allows me to apply any
color or tone to any other color or tone, and I know that sounds a little weird.
But basically, from this drop-down we can select any one of these colors or tones, and
then add or subtract cyan, magenta, yellow or black, or apply their opposite color.
For example, the easiest one to understand is the opposite of black is, of course, white.
When we select black from the drop down, we can drag the black slider to subtract black
from black, which of course gives us white.
When I click on the reset icon, the ones that are harder to understand are the cyan, magenta
and yellow.
These sliders give you the opposite colors.
The opposite of yellow is blue, the opposite of magenta is green, and the opposite of cyan
is red.
I know that can be a little confusing if you're just starting out with Photoshop, but you
could always open the color balance adjustment layer, and this adjustment layer shows you
a much better representation of the relationship between colors, cyan, and red, magenta and
green, yellow and blue.
I'm not exactly sure why Adobe hasn't applied that same color labeling system to the selective
color adjustment layer, but it is what it is.
I'm going to delete this color balance adjustment layer, and we're going to work with the selective
color adjustment layer.
The first thing we have to do is make sure that you're working with an image that does
not have a color cast, or that does not have any other color tones, that way it's easier
to apply the effects that you want to apply.
So, in this case, we have an image with neutral grays, and it's perfect for this example.
I'm going to go into the selective color adjustment layer.
Keep in mind that we're trying to recreate the cinematic effect, which is usually blues
and teals in the darks, and oranges in the highlights, mainly in the skin tones.
The reason that that color combination is used is because those colors are opposite
in the color wheel, and when they're put side by side, they tend to pop.
They make the actress or actor stand out.
So, that's what we want to do.
Now, if you have no idea what I just said, I have a video on cinematic color grading
where I talk about different color combinations.
Where I talk about the color wheel, where I talk about how color affects story, and
I think is one of my best tutorials.
So, you can check it out if you like.
I have a link to it right below in the description.
Anyway, in this tutorial, we're simply going to use the selective color adjustment layer.
The first thing that you have to think about is how dark do you want your darkest colors
in the image to be?
From the drop-down, select blacks.
Then use the black slider to decide how bright the darkest colors are going to be, or how
dark they're going to be.
In this case, I want a lot of contrast because I'm trying to create that cinematic, action
movie effect.
At about 16% should work, and by the way, the values that I use in this image may be
different than the image that you're working with, so use these values as reference.
So, you may need a little bit more or a little bit less.
Then, I need to think about what colors I'm going to add to those shadows, so this is
really what color toning is.
What colors are we going to apply to the darks and to the neutrals?
I want to add a little bit of cyan, decrease the magenta just a little bit to add green,
and decrease the yellow to add blue.
Notice I'm already adding that cinematic look just by adjusting those three sliders, very easy.
That's before and after.
Now that I made those adjustments though, I think my image is not as dark as I would
like it to be, so I can increase the black just to add a little more contrast.
Then, I'm going to go into the neutrals and do the same thing.
I'm going to apply those colors to the neutrals to create a stronger effect.
I'm going to increase the cyan, and this time I'm not going to adjust the magenta,
but I am going to decrease the yellow.
Now that I've done that, I'm getting exactly the colors that I want in the shadows and
neutrals, but the problem is that I'm also affecting the skin tones.
So our actress is looking a little blue.
I can target the colors in her skin tone and counteract that adjustment.
No matter the ethnicity of your model, you can always find their skin tones in the reds
and sometimes even yellows.
But in this case, we're only going to focus
on the reds, and I'm going to decrease the cyan to add red to her skin tones.
I'm going to increase the magenta a little bit, and increase the yellow.
Notice how we're affecting the skin tones now, so that's before and after.
One of the best things about working with adjustment layers is you can always go back
and make adjustments.
After I made all these adjustments, I still think I need more of a pop, so I'm going to
go back in the blacks and increase them even a bit further.
Maybe even make then neutrals a little darker as well.
Before and after.
What I'm going to do now is I'm going to put these two layers into a shell so I can adjust
them even further.
I'm going to hold shift, click on the background, this is going to select both layers, then
I'm going to right click and select convert to smart object.
A smart object will help us protect those two layers as we apply more effects.
If I want to come back and open up that smart object, I can open it just by double-clicking
on it, and I can continue adjusting it.
It's in a new tab.
If I close the tab then I go back into my working document, no I don't want to save it.
What I'm going to do now is apply an effect, so I can go into filter, camera, raw filter.
To further enhance this adjustment, I'm going to increase the vibrance.
Vibrance is a smart way of adding saturation.
Unlike saturation, vibrance protects skin tones, and it also protects pixels that are
already highly saturated, so it's a smarter way of adding saturation.
Saturation simply just bumps the saturation and all pixels equally.
Then I'm going to increase the clarity.
Clarity adds contrast to mid tones, and for this next step, I'm going to zoom into 100%
so that I can look at the details of the image.
I'm going to sharpen the image, and when you sharpen you always want to look at the image
at 100% so that you can see what really is going on.
I'm going to increase the sharpening, and I'm also going to click on this FX icon for
the effects tab.
And I'm going to increase the grain because we're adding a film look effect to this image,
so adding that grain helps us create that illusion of film.
When I'm done, I'm going to press okay.
The advantage of working with a smart object is that you can always come back and click
on this camera raw label to open up the camera raw filter once again and make any other adjustments
that you like.
For example, in the effects tab I can also a vignette, and then press okay when I'm done.
To finalize the effect, I'm going to crop the image, so we can give it the right aspect
ratio that is used in a lot of films.
So, select the crop tool and make sure that you have ratio selected in the drop-down and
in the first input box, type in 2.39.
And in the second one simply type the number 1.
So 2.39x1, this is the aspect ratio used in a lot of movies, and you can simply place
your model into position, and then click on the check mark when you're done to commit
the changes.
That finalizes our movie look effect.
Remember that with this technique you can use any other color combination that you want,
you're not stuck with this color combination.
Let me know in the comments what you think about the orange teal effect.
I know some people don't like it, some people do.
Let me know how you feel about it.
Also, if you create something using this technique, feel free to post the link down below in the
comments, or also if you post it on Instagram, use the hashtag #ptcvids and I often look
for that hashtag to see what you're all up to.
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Thank you so much for watching, and I will talk to you again soon.