Are these skin tones good or bad?

As my photographic journey continues and my skillsets increase I now turn my attention to getting better skintones. Here is my long suffering partner/model once again stepping into the breach helping me to refine my efforts.

I used my Canon 6D coupled with a Canon 50mm 1/8 "nifty fifty"

Settings were;
Manual
1/100 ss
F3/5
ISO 100
flash W/B
spot metering
One shot AF

Godox AD200
Manual
1/32 power
bare bulb head
pixapro shallow beauty dish softbox with a grid attached
she was around 1 metre away

In Lightroom I eyedropped the WB from a white spot on her dress, I increased the exposure a fraction to + 0.33, dialled in a medium tone curve, and then increased the vibrance to +19 and decreased the saturation to - 4 I used my regular neutral picture style set to;

sharpness all the way off
contrast to -3
saturation to -2
colour tone to 0

I have been experimenting with gels to get a good skin tone, and after getting the AD200 i am now just experimenting with the bare bulb head ansd a softbox

I would appreciate some feedback specifically on skin tones I know all skin is different but maybe I just need to understand some basic tenents?

Many thanks

To my eye, the colors look pretty true-to-life. I personally like to add just a bit of warmth, but that's a style choice, and I don't see anything wrong with what you've done here. And I think your exposure is pretty spot-on!

bseitz234 wrote in post #19284103
To my eye, the colors look pretty true-to-life. I personally like to add just a bit of warmth, but that's a style choice, and I don't see anything wrong with what you've done here. And I think your exposure is pretty spot-on!

Agree on all counts.

I could tell they are Canon skin colors by just looking at photos. This is next to only reason why I stick with Canon for over decade now. And cheap used lenses .

mike1958 wrote in post #19283834
... dialled in a medium tone curve, ...

What does that mean?

"Dialled in a medium tone curve"

In lightroom select the Develop module/Tone curve tab at the bottom of the tab you will see menu arrows against the "point curve" heading

click on the arrows and a menu will appear with 3 choices I normally choose the middle selection

Hope that helps

mike1958 wrote in post #19284378
"Dialled in a medium tone curve"

In lightroom select the Develop module/Tone curve tab at the bottom of the tab you will see menu arrows against the "point curve" heading

click on the arrows and a menu will appear with 3 choices I normally choose the middle selection

Hope that helps

Ah, thanks. So it is a kind of custom contrast setting. Is it better than using the Contrast slider?

Curve adjustments and Unsharp Mask are almost always better tools than a contrast slider.

DPP has curve adjustments, as does Photoshop (which also has unsharp mask), too. Curve adjustments allow a myriad of changes from a color balance base setting, midtones, etc. Unsharp mask is a superior tool to controlling contrast as well over a contrast slider.

https://www.diyphotogr​aphy.net …ter-to-increase-contrast/

TeamSpeed wrote in post #19284451
Curve adjustments and Unsharp Mask are almost always better tools than a contrast slider.

Makes sense, but one would have to know what one is doing with the many choices these offer.

DPP has curve adjustments, as does Photoshop (which also has unsharp mask), too. Curve adjustments allow a myriad of changes from a color balance base setting, midtones, etc. Unsharp mask is a superior tool to controlling contrast as well over a contrast slider.

https://www.diyphotogr​aphy.net …ter-to-increase-contrast/

Never imagined using unsharp to adjust contrast. Thanks for the link.

Ever since moving to USM to do contrast, I have never touched the contrast slider again. USM is much more versatile and you can do some great things with layering and using USM to sharpen and contrast slightly. It is a vital part of my high ISO processing action suite.

I use the level tool in Photoshop to sometimes correct WB, and to push/pull shadows/highlights. There are better tools for that though, I just haven't taught this old dog those new tricks.

This is how I was able to pull off ISO 32000 during nighttime competitions, noiseware and judicious use of USM for two aspects of retaining detail after NR.