Photoshop has several simple manual tools you can use to fix color in ways that are different from the Auto Levels, Auto Contrast, and Auto Color commands. They are the Brightness/Contrast control, Color Balance, Desaturate command, and the ever-popular Variations tool.
Avoiding Brightness/Contrast
Beginners gravitate to the Brightness/Contrast control because it seems so simple to use. If your image is too dark, move a slider to make it lighter; if it’s too light, move the same slider to make it darker. Right? You can fix an image that’s overly contrasty or overly flat-looking the same way. Right? Nope.
In practice, the Brightness/Contrast control is a bad choice for making an image darker or lighter, and for adding or reducing contrast. Its chief failing is that it applies all its changes equally to all areas of your image. For example, you may have a photo that has some shadows that need brightening up but all the middle tones and highlights are just fine. The Brightness slider doesn’t take that into account.
Move the slider to the right, and, sure enough, your shadows become brighter. But so do your midtones and highlights, which you probably don’t want. The impulse is to try to fix the bright spots you create with the Brightness slider by fiddling with the Contrast slider. Before you know it, your image is a mess. Be careful. Although some kinds of pictures you can help a little with the Brightness/Contrast control, you’re better off using Levels and Curves, which can tailor your image enhancements to the exact portions of the image you want to work with.
Tweaking with the Color Balance controls
If you remember your color theory you can probably use the Color Balance controls to make some simple changes to the color in your image. The difficult part is in recognizing exactly which color you need to add or subtract from your image in the first place. Colors are subtler than you might think. For example, a slight color cast toward cyan can look a lot like a slightly green or blue color cast. Is your image too red, or does it have too much magenta? Use the Variations command, described in the following section, to figure out how to tell the various color casts apart. Variations displays each of the different types of color casts in an array so you can compare them. To use the Color Balance controls, follow these steps:
1. Choose Image-->Adjustments-->Color Balance, or press Ctrl+B (Ô+B on the Mac) to access the Color Balance dialog box.
2. Choose the Shadows, Midtones, or Highlights option to select the tones of an image you want to work on.
Usually, Midtones is the best choice, unless your image has a color cast in the shadows or highlights that doesn’t affect the overall image. That can sometimes happen when a subject is close to a colored wall or other object that reflects light onto, say, the shadowed side of a subject.
3. Make sure you have selected the Preserve Luminosity option.
That way, Photoshop modifies the colors of the image, but the brightness and contrast of the tones stay the same.
4. Move the Cyan/Red, Magenta/Green, or Yellow/Blue sliders to add or subtract color, watching the effects of your adjustments on the original image.
The Color Levels boxes show the amount of each color that Photoshop adds and subtracts. The colors are arranged by their opposites on the color wheel. Dragging the slider toward Cyan adds cyan to the image and subtracts its complement, red. Dragging toward Green adds green to the image and subtracts magenta.
Resisting the urge to go nuts with sliders
If you’re like me, you like clicking options, adjusting values, and sliding sliders back and forth. Thankfully, Photoshop is happy to oblige you with options to make you feel so powerful that you can take on any project. Was that a sinister laugh I heard? Easy there, partner. I’m about to tell you something that will break your heart at first, but which you’ll thank me for
later: Always pick a single slider and stick with it when you’re trying to compensate for any color cast. Moving two sliders is a waste because you can accomplish anything you want with just one.
For example, if you move both the Cyan/Red and Magenta/Green sliders an equal amount to the left (adding cyan and magenta), you’re actually just adding blue. Moving three sliders is even worse because, depending on the amount and direction of movement, the three are likely to at least partially cancel each other out or multiply the effects. However, if a cast is just in one area, such as the shadows, and a different color cast in another area, it may be useful to do more than one adjustment.
Avoiding Brightness/Contrast
Beginners gravitate to the Brightness/Contrast control because it seems so simple to use. If your image is too dark, move a slider to make it lighter; if it’s too light, move the same slider to make it darker. Right? You can fix an image that’s overly contrasty or overly flat-looking the same way. Right? Nope.
In practice, the Brightness/Contrast control is a bad choice for making an image darker or lighter, and for adding or reducing contrast. Its chief failing is that it applies all its changes equally to all areas of your image. For example, you may have a photo that has some shadows that need brightening up but all the middle tones and highlights are just fine. The Brightness slider doesn’t take that into account.
Move the slider to the right, and, sure enough, your shadows become brighter. But so do your midtones and highlights, which you probably don’t want. The impulse is to try to fix the bright spots you create with the Brightness slider by fiddling with the Contrast slider. Before you know it, your image is a mess. Be careful. Although some kinds of pictures you can help a little with the Brightness/Contrast control, you’re better off using Levels and Curves, which can tailor your image enhancements to the exact portions of the image you want to work with.
Tweaking with the Color Balance controls
If you remember your color theory you can probably use the Color Balance controls to make some simple changes to the color in your image. The difficult part is in recognizing exactly which color you need to add or subtract from your image in the first place. Colors are subtler than you might think. For example, a slight color cast toward cyan can look a lot like a slightly green or blue color cast. Is your image too red, or does it have too much magenta? Use the Variations command, described in the following section, to figure out how to tell the various color casts apart. Variations displays each of the different types of color casts in an array so you can compare them. To use the Color Balance controls, follow these steps:
1. Choose Image-->Adjustments-->Color Balance, or press Ctrl+B (Ô+B on the Mac) to access the Color Balance dialog box.
2. Choose the Shadows, Midtones, or Highlights option to select the tones of an image you want to work on.
Usually, Midtones is the best choice, unless your image has a color cast in the shadows or highlights that doesn’t affect the overall image. That can sometimes happen when a subject is close to a colored wall or other object that reflects light onto, say, the shadowed side of a subject.
3. Make sure you have selected the Preserve Luminosity option.
That way, Photoshop modifies the colors of the image, but the brightness and contrast of the tones stay the same.
4. Move the Cyan/Red, Magenta/Green, or Yellow/Blue sliders to add or subtract color, watching the effects of your adjustments on the original image.
The Color Levels boxes show the amount of each color that Photoshop adds and subtracts. The colors are arranged by their opposites on the color wheel. Dragging the slider toward Cyan adds cyan to the image and subtracts its complement, red. Dragging toward Green adds green to the image and subtracts magenta.
Resisting the urge to go nuts with sliders
If you’re like me, you like clicking options, adjusting values, and sliding sliders back and forth. Thankfully, Photoshop is happy to oblige you with options to make you feel so powerful that you can take on any project. Was that a sinister laugh I heard? Easy there, partner. I’m about to tell you something that will break your heart at first, but which you’ll thank me for
later: Always pick a single slider and stick with it when you’re trying to compensate for any color cast. Moving two sliders is a waste because you can accomplish anything you want with just one.
For example, if you move both the Cyan/Red and Magenta/Green sliders an equal amount to the left (adding cyan and magenta), you’re actually just adding blue. Moving three sliders is even worse because, depending on the amount and direction of movement, the three are likely to at least partially cancel each other out or multiply the effects. However, if a cast is just in one area, such as the shadows, and a different color cast in another area, it may be useful to do more than one adjustment.
Using Simple Color Correctors in Photoshop
![Using Simple Color Correctors in Photoshop]()
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