Recreating the look of analog films is a surprisingly subtle job that can require several different tools. There are of course magic filters for mobile apps that attempt to achieve the analog look, and desktop applications that have powerful and effective analog presets, like the DxO Nik Collection or ON1 Photo RAW. For this project I’m creating my analog effect manually in Capture One – though you can do the same in Lightroom (see the brief instructions at the end) and other photo editors.
Color adjustment
A good term to describe the HSL (hue, saturation, lightness) adjustments provided in many image-editors. You can use these to change the appearance of specific colors in an image while leaving the rest unaltered.
The new Lightroom Point Color tool and how it works
The Adobe October 2023 update brought a few new features, and the Lightroom Point Color tool is one of them. It’s part of an overhaul of the old HSL/Color panel, which has now been renamed as the Color Mixer. So how do these new tools work, and do they actually work any better?
Lightroom color adjustments made easy
Sometimes the colors in your image aren’t quite right and it’s not all of them but perhaps one in particular. White balance, saturation and vibrance adjustments affect the whole image, so how do you target specific colors? In Lightroom it’s easy.
Can you intensify color by reducing it?
Color is a complex thing. It doesn’t get its intensity solely from saturation, but also from contrast. This can include color contrast with colors on opposite sides of the color wheel, brightness contrast between bright and dark colors, and another type of contrast we can call ’saturation contrast’. This is where you contrast strongly saturated […]
How much color do you need: Kynance Cove in Cornwall
How much color do you need? Color is a complex thing, and sometimes less is more. Sometimes flat-out, full-on saturation works, but sometimes it seems you just need hints of color to get an equally strong effect.
HSL color editing and how it works
You’re probably used to digital images being in the RGB mode, where the full range of colors is generated with red, green and blue color ‘channels’. But most photo editing programs offer a color editing mode based around the HSL (Hue, Saturation, Lightness) color model, and this is where it gets really interesting.
How to highlight a color and then suppress the rest
Color is great, most of the time. But sometimes colors can fight with each other or just undermine the mood you’re trying to create. This is where an understanding of how your software’s color controls work can be a big advantage.
HSL (Hue, Saturation, Lightness) adjustments and what they can do
Global HSL adjustments aren’t very useful. If you shift the global hue of an image it quickly looks wrong. The real strength of the HSL system is the way it lets you separate and edit individual colors.
How to carry out white balance and color adjustments in Exposure X
White balance and color corrections are basic image adjustments you’d expect to find in any photo-editing application, so let’s see how they are applied in Exposure X. We’ll use this interior shot of a boutique hotel as an example because it has some very serious color issues caused my the mixed lighting. The strong blue/purple […]