i agree with the general disdain for selective coloring, but

what are your thoughts on this example? i wanted to include the crowd, but at the same time i didn't want them to be distracting. i really didn't like the red/magenta colour cast, either.

sorry the second pic is so large. it's been resized, but i think the larger version might be cached or something for a bit.

Looks OK, as far as spot coloring goes, but like most spot colored photos I just don't see the point. Color highlights come with the territory of concert photos, especially in smaller venues ... but if you found the red lighting on the crowd distracting there are plenty of other things you could have done to minimize the distraction besides that.

rpaul wrote in post #13089801
... but if you found the red lighting on the crowd distracting there are plenty of other things you could have done to minimize the distraction besides that.

that was my initial thought process. my processing abilities are limited, so at first i was going to try and desaturate the red in the crowd a little bit, but i couldn't get it to look quite right so i just kept going.

I find that the crowd is just as distracting because you drew attention to them with the selective color. (you just can't win, right?) It isn't natural to look at this bar scene with color flashing lights, and see a large swath of the photo desaturated to b&w. THAT, in itself, draws its own sort of attention. I don't think I would do anything to the crowd. They HAVE to be there, they are part of the story and the background, the singer has to have someone to sing to. I like the photo just as it is, although I might crop out a bit of the crowd on the right side to give the singer a bit more attention. Is that a 16:9 aspect ratio? Anyhoooooooooooo, I like the shot as is, but applaud your efforts to fix a problem that in MY opinion only, doesn't exist.

thanks for your thoughts, sue. it's not 16:9, just a custom crop. i wanted sort of a unique perspective of the singer (win butler of arcade fire) singing out to more of the audience without making them the focus. kind of a catch-22.

Just wondering: why did you leave color in the row of lights on the right side if you were going to take it away from the crowd?

joedlh wrote in post #13090748
Just wondering: why did you leave color in the row of lights on the right side if you were going to take it away from the crowd?

i don't know to be honest. i never really thought about it. the more i look at the b+w crowd, the more i hate i though.

I like original, it's vibrant.
Try all black and white with more contrast if you find colors distracting

The lack of colour in the crowd actually drew my eye to them rather than the peformer on stage. Might just be me though.

Iscariotau wrote in post #13092626
The lack of colour in the crowd actually drew my eye to them rather than the peformer on stage. Might just be me though.

+ 1

joedlh wrote in post #13090748
Just wondering: why did you leave color in the row of lights on the right side if you were going to take it away from the crowd?

What might looks cool is to take everything but the singer and make it black and white like below:

HTTP response: 404 | MIME changed to 'text/html' | Byte size: ZERO

I like the original best.

i prefer the one above. the original the singer just blends in and the intended impact is lost imh