# Skin Tone Help



## MTVision (Oct 26, 2011)

I watched a tutorial about skin tone by the numbers - how Cyan should be about 1/3 of Magenta and yellow should be slightly higher then magenta. Everytime I try following this the skin tone comes out looking wrong to me. My monitor isn't calibrated so maybe its just me but here is an example.  The person in the photo is the one whose skin tone I have the hardest time with since he is a red head. His skin looks really orange red to me. How would I fix this? I tried curves and hue adjustment but I can't get it right. I'm also not that great in photoshop so any advice will be greatly appreciated!





Does this photo look too sharp?


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## KmH (Oct 26, 2011)

It looks very fake.

Use a color checker. Without a calibrated display it's a crap shoot other wise.

I highly recommend X-RITE products.

Now discontinued, was $250....X-Rite i1Display 2 Color Calibrator for LCD, CRT, and Laptop Displays 

X-Rite MSCCC ColorChecker Chart 

_*A better kit*_;
X-Rite ColorChecker Passport 

_*And a great group of tutorials*_:

Tutorials on Color Management & Printing


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## Peano (Oct 26, 2011)

Can you post the image as it came out of the camera, with no editing at all?


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## MTVision (Oct 26, 2011)

Peano said:
			
		

> Can you post the image as it came out of the camera, with no editing at all?



Yeah - I always forget to do that! Give me a few minutes - I'm not at my computer.


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## joealcantar (Oct 26, 2011)

KmH said:


> It looks very fake.
> 
> Use a color checker. Without a calibrated display it's a crap shoot other wise.
> 
> ...


-
Watched a seminar on this unit the other day and it looks promising , going to try it myself to see how it works out.   You can watch for the i1Display 2 getting sold as the new one came out so folks are probably getting rid of old units.  I picked up one for $60 bucks used and it works fine. 
-
Here is a link to some of the seminars: 
X-Rite: Get exactly the color you need, every time, anywhere in the world.
-
Here is a rebate form for webinar attendees that may work as well.
http://www.macgroupus.com/xrite/webinar/Webninar_Passport_Rebate.pdf
Shoot well, Joe


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## MTVision (Oct 26, 2011)

Peano said:


> Can you post the image as it came out of the camera, with no editing at all?



JPEG from camera




This is from Camera Raw - I didn't change any of the settings - I left it the way camera raw rendered it


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## joealcantar (Oct 26, 2011)

You have two different lights hitting the face so it will be a little tough to even out.  
-
Shoot well, Joe


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## Peano (Oct 26, 2011)

The red channel is very hot; most of the skin details are gone from that. So I first duplicated the background layer, copied the green channel and pasted that into the red channel, and changed blend mode of that layer to luminosity. That restores some detail to the skin.

After that, I selected just the face and used a curves adjustment layer to tweak that. Then selected the background and used a selective color adjustment layer to tone that way down. Finally, I used the shadows/highlights filter to brighten the face a little.


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## MTVision (Oct 26, 2011)

joealcantar said:
			
		

> You have two different lights hitting the face so it will be a little tough to even out.
> -
> Shoot well, Joe


 
Thanks for the links Keith and Joe!

Joe
Stupid question - What would be the 2 different lights? 
Is it because he was kind of in shade but the sun was hitting the other side?


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## MTVision (Oct 26, 2011)

Peano said:
			
		

> The red channel is very hot; most of the skin details are gone from that. So I first duplicated the background layer, copied the green channel and pasted that into the red channel, and changed blend mode of that layer to luminosity. That restores some detail to the skin.
> 
> After that, I selected just the face and used a curves adjustment layer to tweak that. Then selected the background and used a selective color adjustment layer to tone that way down. Finally, I used the shadows/highlights filter to brighten the face a little.



Thank you so much! I'll have to try that. I never knew you could copy one channel to the other. Do you or have you ever tried to get the skin tone right from the CMY values? I'm just curious because on other photos where the skin color looks right the. CMY values don't match the "formula" or even come close.


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## joealcantar (Oct 26, 2011)

MTVision said:


> joealcantar said:
> 
> 
> 
> ...


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Kind of , he was in the shade under the hood and half the face was exposed to sun.  Just watch how you pose and where you pose as it creates more work for you in the future.  Not everything is fixable in photoshop.
-
Joe


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## dots (Oct 26, 2011)

I'd use the in-camera white balance modes.


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## MTVision (Oct 26, 2011)

dots said:
			
		

> I'd use the in-camera white balance modes.



I actually used a custom white balance but ended up fixing the WB in RAW. 

The sun was going down so the light was different during this picture and the custom WB didn't work anymore. 


Joe-
Thanks for everything. Yeah most of the shots were without the sweatshirt but it was freezing so he put it on!


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## Tee (Oct 26, 2011)

I try to avoid greenery for the same problems you are having.  If I am I use my custom white balance and have them hold a grey card and find I get better results.


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## Peano (Oct 26, 2011)

MTVision said:


> Thank you so much! I'll have to try that. I never knew you could copy one channel to the other. Do you or have you ever tried to get the skin tone right from the CMY values? I'm just curious because on other photos where the skin color looks right the. CMY values don't match the "formula" or even come close.



I sometimes monitor CMYK values when adjusting skin tones (I did in this case), but I don't come anywhere near to following any formula. In this case the cyan value was 1%, which told me the reds were probably out of the ballpark, so I checked the red channel and found it was mostly clipped.

Chris Orwig has some pretty useful discussion of CMYK for skin tones, in section 3 at this link: Photoshop CS4 Tutorials | Portrait Retouching Essential Training

For me, monitoring CMYK values has been most useful as training in seeing skin tones in those terms. If the color is amiss, I can often just "see" that there's too much magenta or not enough yellow or whatever.


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## MTVision (Oct 26, 2011)

Peano said:
			
		

> I sometimes monitor CMYK values when adjusting skin tones (I did in this case), but I don't come anywhere near to following any formula. In this case the cyan value was 1%, which told me the reds were probably out of the ballpark, so I checked the red channel and found it was mostly clipped.
> 
> Chris Orwig has some pretty useful discussion of CMYK for skin tones, in section 3 at this link: Photoshop CS4 Tutorials | Portrait Retouching Essential Training
> 
> For me, monitoring CMYK values has been most useful as training in seeing skin tones in those terms. If the color is amiss, I can often just "see" that there's too much magenta or not enough yellow or whatever.



I really appreciate all the help! I've only had photoshop for about 2 months so I don't really know how to do a lot! 

I did a black and white conversion like you suggested - doing it in layers (the face, the hood, etc). It came out really nice so thank you for that idea as well!!


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## clanthar (Oct 26, 2011)

MTVision said:


> Peano said:
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Megan,

That CMYK formula you've found is for use in a pre-press shop. I noted that Peano also responded and mentioned not paying too much attention to it.

By the way -- Peano -- nice job with the edit.

You can monitor CMYK values with Photoshop's Info window. Just wanted to note here that you should NEVER actually convert your photo to CMYK mode. Your photo is RGB and it's OK (mostly) to convert it to Lab mode and back, but never to CMYK.

That's a tough image; I've been sitting here poking at it a little and I'm prepared to admit defeat but I'll post what I got anyway. The central portion of his face that's in the sun is pretty clipped. I think given the RAW file it can be better processed. Here's what I got, I started by assuming his tee shirt was white.

If you'd like numbers to use for skin tone placement, pay attention to the Hue value. Average adult skin in an sRGB photo has a Hue value in the upper teens to mid twenties.

Joe


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## KmH (Oct 26, 2011)

That's just over 12 hours of instruction - Photoshop CS4 Tutorials | Portrait Retouching Essential Training


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## Assassin (Oct 29, 2011)

MTVision said:
			
		

> I watched a tutorial about skin tone by the numbers - how Cyan should be about 1/3 of Magenta and yellow should be slightly higher then magenta. Everytime I try following this the skin tone comes out looking wrong to me. My monitor isn't calibrated so maybe its just me but here is an example.  The person in the photo is the one whose skin tone I have the hardest time with since he is a red head. His skin looks really orange red to me. How would I fix this? I tried curves and hue adjustment but I can't get it right. I'm also not that great in photoshop so any advice will be greatly appreciated!
> 
> http://www.flickr.com/photos/68805931@N02/6283685659/
> 
> Does this photo look too sharp?



Applying skin tones to an uncalibrated monitor, well.... Calibration is THE most important step... Some great tips here as well...


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## Peano (Oct 29, 2011)

KmH said:


> That's just over 12 hours of instruction - Photoshop CS4 Tutorials | Portrait Retouching Essential Training



Yes, if you pay for it. The free part (section 3) that I recommended runs a little over half an hour.


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