Color Balance

Hi everyone! Today, instead of publishing some figure photos, I thought I would write few lines about an easy trick to change the look of any picture. It is just some color balance settings I have been (over?)using lately, in Extravaganza girls, Yoko, Reimu-chan and di:stage photo articles. So I thought it would be great to share this too.

Actually the process comes from the split toning, a darkroom toning technique, and is mostly meant to adjust the colors of a black and white photo. I found it on phototuts+, where other neat effects are described, still aimed for black and white art.

Split toning is a popular darkroom toning technique that is based on the principle that some chemical toners work on the dark tones of the photo first and others on the light tones. The result is a photo toned with two different colors.

But I ended up applying it accidentally to a full color photo – and liked the result. Here are some examples you might already have seen, but this time with their original shots aside.

Original | ID#80101 | Large

Color Balance | ID#80102 | Large

Original | ID#80103 | Large

Color Balance | ID#80104 | Large

Original | ID#80105 | Large

Color Balance | ID#80106 | Large

Sweet isn’t it? And here is how to proceed, at least with photoshop -

Split Blue and Copper Toning

1. Select the ‘Layer > New Adjustment Layer > Color Balance’ menu
2. Click ‘OK’
3. Set the ‘Tone Balance’ to Shadows
4. Set the Cyan/Red slider to -30 and the Yellow/Blue slider to +30
5. Set ‘Tone Balance’ to Highlights
6. Set the Cyan/Red slider to +40 and the Yellow/Blue slider to -30.
7. Done!

Since we tone shadows and highlights, this split toning works best with high-contrast images. You might experiment with the settings so that the tones suit your photo. Indeed, these settings are a good base to start with, but there is really no restrictions. The only rule is to tone shadows with a color, highlights with another, and let the midtones blend everything.

I added four more examples, with a black and white version.

Original | ID#80107 | Large

Color Balance | ID#80108 | Large

Black&White | ID#80109 | Large

Original | ID#80110 | Large

Color Balance | ID#80111 | Large

Black&White | ID#80112 | Large

Original | ID#80113 | Large

Color Balance | ID#80114 | Large

Black&White | ID#80115 | Large

Original | ID#80116 | Large

Color Balance | ID#80117 | Large

Black&White | ID#80118 | Large

I think it gives a nice tint to a picture, and allows to compensate an unsatisfying white balance. Colors look warmer, and it works really great on pictures with high contrasts. Full color or black and white.

And somehow I can think of it as a magic formula to improve a picture’s colors – which is even more true when I deal with snaps taken indoor with poor lightning, and I feel too lazy to properly configure the white balance of my camera ^^;;
Also the funny thing is that once I have applied this filter, the picture looks so much better that it is impossible to go back to the original colors, which look so drab.

But well, it should be used wisely, since it can really alter some colors, like whites or the darker ones, in an unwanted way as well.

Anyway, feel free to try this. The results can be really amazing ~_^

end note: and for those you would like to make the same rainbow-like picture I did for this post’s header, here is a nice tutorial I used ^^