best color correction method

I've been doing photography for a while and I'm realizing in post there are a lot of different ways

What is the most effective way you have seen?

Prefer links to videos or tutorials.
I don't mind paying if it is something well regarded by many.

I've used curves. I've messed with hue saturation levels per color. Everything seems to yield different results and the curves seems to leave my colors looking yellow/orange after selecting the "true" neutral grey according to the curves method. with the 50% gray on difference etc

sorry I shoot in camera RAW and use photoshop btw

/edit

secondly, anyone have any online sites they recommend like lynda etc

It's tedious, but I like using the levels tool in PS to set the whitest and blackest pixels. No doubt there's an explanation of the process on POTN - that's probably where I learned how to do it.

I rarely use saturation. If the colors are true but muted, bumping up the shadows works much better.

[edit] I almost forgot, when a photo looks too yellow or blue to me, my first response is to use the PS selective color tool.

What are you shooting? In the studio I will usually use a color checker to set up a color profile. For landscapes I usually set the camera to "Daylight" and leave it alone. I'll check the different camera profiles to see how they effect the colors and then adjust individual colors to taste. I'm wary of things that look like white or black as they often end up being a bit blue as well, which pushes the image too warm.

Could you post some of your photos for us to see? So we can see what you need to correct?

I typically use Raya Pro and run the color setup and adjust each to taste.

The best method is frankly shooting it right in camera and not needing to correct in post-production. Shoot well exposed, properly white balanced images and you are pretty much done. Throw in a custom camera profile for the best results. A few seconds in advance can save hours in post-production editing.

Shooting "right" in camera is ideal and I'd assume most do. The act of color correcting is two fold. One to get natural colors (can be done if shot properly exposed w/ correct WB) and two, correcting the image to enhance colors for your artistic intent which cannot be done in camera.

Getting right in the camera is only half the battle. Post processing is the other half

If you get it right in camera there isn't a battle in post-production. That's the whole point.

I can try to link some images later.
Most of the stuff I shoot, which can be found at www.nickaufiero.com is fine for what I do but lately I've been moving into professional head shots and notice that the color correcting is kinda whack.
Lately I've been doing auto white balance since I've been in a hurry but I assume just get one of those grey cards to carry around and check the white balance off of that?

I am a little noob with this stuff since honestly I shoot B/W 90% of the time. Other times I get it fixed with camera RAW in photoshop so

thanks again for the inputs and links of some nature are perfectly fine with me

Nick Aufiero wrote in post #18297206
I can try to link some images later.
Most of the stuff I shoot, which can be found at www.nickaufiero.com is fine for what I do but lately I've been moving into professional head shots and notice that the color correcting is kinda whack.
Lately I've been doing auto white balance since I've been in a hurry but I assume just get one of those grey cards to carry around and check the white balance off of that?

I am a little noob with this stuff since honestly I shoot B/W 90% of the time. Other times I get it fixed with camera RAW in photoshop so

thanks again for the inputs and links of some nature are perfectly fine with me

Once your lighting is dialed in, have your first headshot subject of the day hold a ColorChecker or similar reference tool, and take a reference shot. After that, don't change the lighting; or, if you do, take another shot of the ColorChecker with the new lighting. At the computer, make sure your monitor is calibrated, then use the ColorChecker reference shot(s) to generate a profile for that lighting.

If you don't want to deal with a ColorChecker, then in most cases, a color-neutral gray card will get you 95% of the way there, either for setting custom white balance in the camera, or for setting it after the fact in post.

Using neither a gray card nor a ColorChecker, it'll be hard to get perfectly neutral color balance. If you value consistency, Auto White Balance will give you nothing but heartache.

Having said that: True neutral color balance isn't always what you want. For professional headshots it should get you very close. Sometimes people look better if you warm it up by 150K or so.

Thanks a lot. I will see you at my local camera store has and if all else fails I will get a neutral gray to you. For the most part I will be using natural lighting outside so I figured the gray card might be a little faster so I will check that out and see you to get me and I will be sure to remove auto white balance. I honestly just got a bad habit of using it because I've been till this point I've never needed to be 100% correct and a lot of my stuff is heavily post process anyways with some kind of color grading

ashleykaryl wrote in post #18296556
If you get it right in camera there isn't a battle in post-production. That's the whole point.

+1,000,000

If I am shooting in daylight, or using flash, I use AWB. If not, I use CWB. That takes care of 98.3% of my color issues. If I do correct any color issues in post, I do it to taste. I tried curves. Way too much of a learning curve for me. I can do everything I need in the BASIC Panel with Clarity, Vibrance, and Saturation. Very rarely, I'll use the HSL/COLOR panel. Maybe a handful of photos in a year. Oh, using LR5.7.

yeah I mean I do the same. I mess with CWB sometimes but for everything I do its on the go and can be corrected easily later on with no issues.
I just noticed with professional headshots its a lot harder to do with the manual methods but I bought a spyder color chcker thing earlier so I'll be using that with head shots from now on

Perhaps people are misunderstanding me. I was talking about photography in general, not just color correction. I would never dream of showing someone a photo I took SOOC, except to illustrate a before and after processing scenario.