Skin tone ? Help me fix this

So, here's a photo of my wife, in artificial lighting with flash bounced off the ceiling. The first variant looks too red and the other one too pale, I am trying to find the right WB for skin tones. Tried boosting yellow but did not like the result. What would you do and how ?

IMAGE LINK: https://flic.kr/p/qX4M​oD

IMAGE LINK: https://flic.kr/p/qFfQ​wx

I don't know what software you are working in but if you are happy with the rest of the image and using Lightroom you could adjust the skin tone selectively using the adjustment brush till you achieve a result you find pleasing.

I work in Capture One Pro but I also have LR, I guess the problem is not that I know how to use the adjustment brush, but that I suck in getting the right tones

The first one has the right complexion but too reddish, and somehow I just can't get the right balance between red and yellow tones, so want to see how someone with better eye / technique would do this.

Ahhhh. Got ya. To be honest though the 1st one looks plausible but I guess that is subjective. Again, if it is just too red you could selectively desaturate the red a little in LR.

Did that, the problem is it makes her look pale. Close to the 2nd photo although this was more of a straightforward temp change. I need to somehow change yellow / red balance or turn red into pink, but that's exactly what I am having a problem with.

http://www.tipsquirrel​.com …g-rgb-curves-lightroom-5/

GIX-600 wrote in post #17405527
http://www.tipsquirrel​.com …g-rgb-curves-lightroom-5/

Or

http://www.texaschicks​blogsandpics.com …or-curves-by-the-numbers/

https://pixelationblog​.wordpress.com …-skin-tones-in-lightroom/

A couple of things - 1) how did you white balance this image? If you selected a "flash" preset, just remember that you are bouncing the flash off of your ceiling and surrounding environment, and the light is picking up that cast as well - the preset may not yield accurate or pleasing results.

2) in CaptureOne, there is a tab in the White Balance tool that permits you to establish a white balance based on skin tone (see attached screen shot). When skin tone is a priority, maybe this will help, assuming you can get close with one of the presets. You can also isolate the skin tone in the Skin Tone tab of the Color Editor tool and tweak it to your heart's content. Try using the Uniformity slider to smooth variation in the skin tone as well. This way, you are not trying to get the desired skin tone by having to manipulate the entire color range of the image (i.e., with the WB sliders).

Using the Color Editor, you can isolate the skin tone and you do not need to apply any layered, local adjustment or resort to using an adjustment brush like in LR.

FYI - on my display, the first image looks about correct (slightly cool), but desaturated; the second image looks like the skin tone has a bluish, cyan cast. The rendition above by GIX-600 looks reasonable and pleasing but has added warmth to the entire image (the background walls, etc.).

If the first image was slightly cool (blue) and you saw it as too red, and removed red, then removal of red is like adding green/cyan. Also, your second image has no color profile tag embedded - because the first one was sRGB, I assume that the second one is as well.

Coincidentally, Phase One just has a webinar about portrait retouching in CaptureOne - I have not watched it yet, but here is the link:

http://blog.phaseone.c​om/learn-retouching-best/

maybe this will give some more tips.

kirk

kirkt wrote in post #17405592
A couple of things - 1) how did you white balance this image? If you selected a "flash" preset, just remember that you are bouncing the flash off of your ceiling and surrounding environment, and the light is picking up that cast as well - the preset may not yield accurate or pleasing results.

2) in CaptureOne, there is a tab in the White Balance tool that permits you to establish a white balance based on skin tone (see attached screen shot). When skin tone is a priority, maybe this will help, assuming you can get close with one of the presets. You can also isolate the skin tone in the Skin Tone tab of the Color Editor tool and tweak it to your heart's content. Try using the Uniformity slider to smooth variation in the skin tone as well. This way, you are not trying to get the desired skin tone by having to manipulate the entire color range of the image (i.e., with the WB sliders).

Using the Color Editor, you can isolate the skin tone and you do not need to apply any layered, local adjustment or resort to using an adjustment brush like in LR.

FYI - on my display, the first image looks about correct (slightly cool), but desaturated; the second image looks like the skin tone has a bluish, cyan cast. The rendition above by GIX-600 looks reasonable and pleasing but has added warmth to the entire image (the background walls, etc.).

If the first image was slightly cool (blue) and you saw it as too red, and removed red, then removal of red is like adding green/cyan. Also, your second image has no color profile tag embedded - because the first one was sRGB, I assume that the second one is as well.

Coincidentally, Phase One just has a webinar about portrait retouching in CaptureOne - I have not watched it yet, but here is the link:

http://blog.phaseone.c​om/learn-retouching-best/

maybe this will give some more tips.

kirk

"The rendition above by GIX-600 looks reasonable and pleasing but has added warmth to the entire image (the background walls, etc.)."

Mixed lighting makes problems in that type of image. Flash and ambient light differ a lot.

And your rendition looks nice, regardless of how it affected the tungsten-lit background elements - I have no way of knowing, however, if the OP wanted to avoid warming everything, which is why I suggested a targeted adjustment to the skin.

I did not mean to be critical of your approach or output.

kirk

kirkt wrote in post #17405592
2) in CaptureOne, there is a tab in the White Balance tool that permits you to establish a white balance based on skin tone (see attached screen shot). When skin tone is a priority, maybe this will help, assuming you can get close with one of the presets. You can also isolate the skin tone in the Skin Tone tab of the Color Editor tool and tweak it to your heart's content. Try using the Uniformity slider to smooth variation in the skin tone as well. This way, you are not trying to get the desired skin tone by having to manipulate the entire color range of the image (i.e., with the WB sliders).

Man, remember that huge thread we had a few months ago, arguing whether Capture One was the superior raw converter? That whole thread, nobody mentioned this tool.

This, now THIS is something useful that might make me want to try C1. Nearly every photo I take has a person in it, and I almost always want to balance for skin tones.


[edit] That Lightroom by-the-numbers tutorial is useful. I've used the skin-by-the-numbers concept before in Photoshop, and I'm familiar with the RGB curves in Lightroom, but it never occurred to be to assemble all those thoughts into the method explained in that link.

Here's my take, but since I don't know her actual skin tone it's hard to gauge how to correct it. I find this pleasing.

Yes, it is an excellent feature, although I didn't like their presets and made a couple of my own. And when used on the global image it can sometimes really throw off the overall WB, but since C1 uses a layered interface, it is really best on a selection layer.

Using layers in C1 made me think about how it might be done in LR. It is generally said that LR doesn't do layers, but this isn't quite true - the brush, grad filter and rad filter are in effect layered locally over the image. What it doesn't do is blend modes other than Normal. At any rate, I made a local adjustment preset whose single parameter is the color overlay in a skin tone that I like (H=30, S=75). I brush over a face and then use minus Saturation to control the blend of the overlay; at 0 the blend of the overlay with the original color seems to be about 50/50, at -100, because the base color has become grey, the color is all from the overlay (30/75) while the luminosity is from whatever the grey is. Therefore, an Exposure adjustment may also be needed.

The edit below was done in LR5 with my skin tone overlay and (on the brush) Saturation -33, Exposure -0.5.

nathancarter wrote in post #17405752
Nearly every photo I take has a person in it, and I almost always want to balance for skin tones..

This comment points out the advantage of taking a shot with deliberately inserted neutral tone (white or grey) in the shot, for color balance purposes. Yes, it is not always possible (or convenient) but it has its advantages.

We see a very different interpretation between rrblint and tzalman's renditions, and without the neutral target (or the OP's excellent familiarity with his own wife -- who might not be in the photo!) we have no way to assess which is closer to reality.

Wilt wrote in post #17407046
This comment points out the advantage of taking a shot with deliberately inserted neutral tone (white or grey) in the shot, for color balance purposes. Yes, it is not always possible (or convenient) but it has its advantages.

We see a very different interpretation between rrblint and tzalman's renditions, and without the neutral target (or the OP's excellent familiarity with his own wife -- who might not be in the photo!) we have no way to assess which is closer to reality.

The problem is that an accurate WB will frequently not produce an attractive skin tone; either because the subject is a few years past having the classic "peaches and cream" complexion of a 16 year old or because human skin has a sort of metamerism by which it changes color under certain lights and an accurate rendering of that color shift is not desired.

The challenge is to keep the WB of the environment acceptable while isolating skin tone from its influence, but this makes the skin tone more a product of the photographer/retoucher​'s aesthetic tastes and judgement than of any independent standard like a grey card. But after all, isn't that why we shoot Raw?