How can I use Blacks without affecting flesh tones?

[BBRoberts]

HiHi !

One of my biggest beefs with lightroom 2 is that it has a black slider applying blacks to everything in the photo instead of just black parts of a photo. Sometimes its nice granted to apply black to a whole photo and I do it often enough, but it would be nice too if there was an independent black with the rest of the colors where you can apply the the various levels. I do a lot of photos of bike races and portraits of bike riders in colorful kits and the only thing I really do wish lightroom did better was have a flesh tone module and also one for blacks. When I apply blacks to a whole photo, the flesh tones darken and I don't like that. I can lighten them up with using the luminance of orange or in photoshop if I had to, I can sculpt out a certain area and apply color or brightness independently without blowing out the whole photo. Lightroom does amazingly well and blows PS away for my needs, but it could use a few more tools I guess. What is the best way to get your flesh tones right and use blacks without them affecting each other? Is there a easy way to do it, or is a hassle? I use temp white balance sparingly to set my overall appearence and it sets a nice flesh tone for starters, but then blacks drag them down darker then I want. I used fill too, but I find a lot of it just keeps going in circles.

Thanks,
BBRoberts

 

[Mark Sirota]

I think you may be misunderstanding what the Blacks slider is designed to do. It is setting the black point in your photo. It inherently has to affect the entire photo.

Can you post some examples to show what it is you're trying to accomplish? Perhaps we can suggest another way to accomplish it.

 

[BBRoberts]

I want to know how to maintain my fleshtones, while using the black. My eyes hurt too much tonight to finesse a demo, but reality its a pretty simple question. I want to know how to maintain my flesh tones while using the blacks. The second part of that question was which is the best way to work on flesh tones in a general sense.

thanks,
BBRoberts

 

[Mark Sirota]

Does it work better for you to not crunch the blacks so much, but drag down the Darks and/or Shadows sliders in the tone curve? (Try dragging the left and middle triangles under the tone curve too; they affect which part of the curve are affected by the sliders.)

Consider also some negative Vibrance (not too much!), if you find the saturation too much after working the Blacks.

 

[BBRoberts]

Yeah, I use the blacks only when needed. Many photos don't need the blacks, but some do, and then it makes the fleshtones darker. I haven't had the time or patience yet to finesse the tone curve.

How about a skin tone or flesh tone plugin? Either photoshop or Lightroom. How about portraiture plugin? Its very advanced and expensive as well. I am betting there are other plugs out there to fix fleshtones. I can edit the tiff with PS, no problem. I have seen and used a lot of plugs, but I can't remember one for fleshtones.

Thanks,
Bruce

 

[Victoria Bampton]

I think you're going to have to post examples of what you're looking for Bruce - we're all stabbing in the dark without seeing the kind of image you mean.

 

[areohbee]

As I see it, there are two issues:

- Darkening.
- Color Shift.

Darkening can be handled by increasing exposure, brightness, fill-light, or decreasing contrast, (or local adjustments).

My experience is that color shift is only a problem if increasing the black slider a lot. In which case I use split toning or a local color brush to compensate (or edit first in NX2, since there is less color shift in NX2 when adjusting the black level).

PS - Regarding flesh colors - they're handled like all other colors: first camera-profile and/or white balance, then HSL (global Hue, Saturation & Luminance). and maybe a pinch of color/sat/tone brushing...

I'm not saying a dedicated flesh module wouldn't be nice, but until then...

PPS - I doubt its going to happen as a Lightroom plugin anytime soon - not enough info available to plugins for that - there's always external editors/plugins, of course.

 

[BBRoberts]

Well, there is a limit to file size plus total, so I have to do two replies. This didn't turn out as well as I hoped. However, this shows two photos. One has a darker road, the other lighter. I did this quickly so its not a good comparison but you get the idea. In this instance I use the blacks to make the payment darker, but I want to keep the riders at normal levels, not darker. When you use blacks to make the road darker, the riders are caught in the dragnet. I don't like that, since in many photos, certain aspects you want to make darker with blacks, but other aspects you want to remain at normal levels. Raising brightness makes the pavement lighter again, going in circles.

 

[BBRoberts]

Here is a touchup done on flesh tones using portraiture plugin. This is better then what I could of done in Lightroom, but I didn't finesse the tones on portraiture. This was their auto setting for one out of five preset applications, for instance, one setting is called glamour. I do like the warmer slider as it reminds me of temp, but it has nice texture, color and it also is applies to certain areas automagically. I don't know of any plugins for fleshtones that are good except this one. It also costs as much as Lightroom just for the plugin. In Lightoom, ideally, I would not want blacks to affect my fleshtones, and it would be nice to also do this, but I wish software was smart enough to mask certain areas and apply various tools without creating layers.

Thanks,
Bruce

 

[Brad Snyder]

In the posting with two images, the second is clearly a mis-application of the Blacks slider. In the first image, the black point seems appropriate to me. That is to say, the black things in the image are black in the photo, the big logo, the speed limit sign, the blacks in the bikes and apparel/gear. I don't see much loss of shadow detail, not a lot of shadows, but even in the first image, the blacks may be pushed too far.

If your goal in the second is to darken up the pavement, I think your better choice is to use a gradient or local adjustment. Personally, I'd leave it alone; it is what it is. Or, frame the shot in such a way as to crop it out.

 

[BBRoberts]

Of course it's a mis-application of the black slider. I did that to make my point. People often talk in terms of how tools are applied instead of thinking in terms of what a person is trying to accomplish when asking questions. Obviously I want to make the pavement darker, and whatever they reasons are for doing that doesn't matter since it's a personal choice. What matters are the issues I presented and how to go about doing this. The two photos were only meant to demostrate a problem. The problem is how to make the pavement darker without changing the levels of the riders. I guess if I wanted to make the pavement jet black, that's my personal choice, but how would I keep the riders at normal levels while making it jet black? This is a techincal question, not an observation about how to fix the photos above. Sorry for frustration on my part, venting...

Anyway,
thanks,
Bruce

 

[BBRoberts]

In this business, there are many instances depending on the brightness of the pavement, sun or clouds, and various country settings which you would indeed want to make the road a darker texture, because it offers a nice contrast between the riders and the pavement. However blacks is also applied to other various parts of the photo, and that can be tricky. Get an idea of how to keep the riders at same levels is good for starters. There is always more I can do later. In Utah, they have red pavement, its beautiful. So one could even perhaps change the pavement to various shades and textures. I often use Lightroom to fool around with what's possible, as I do with various plugins.

thanks,
Bruce

 

[areohbee]

if I wanted to make the pavement jet black, that's my personal choice, but how would I keep the riders at normal levels while making it jet black?

The only way to affect one region without affecting like regions in Lightroom is using the local adjustments, e.g. paint brush. And, if you want more control over local adjustments, you have to use an external editor.

 

[BBRoberts]

Are local adjustments better done in Photoshop? While I have done that in PS for many years, I have not tried any brushing in LR. I am still wondering why the creators did not include a black color in its color panel? That way you could adjust blacks like other colors independently while not affecting the entire photo. Black slider seems good as a global tool, but at times I only want it applied to various places. Perhaps a sophisicated magnetic lasso tool plugin would be helpful. I find PS tools to be tedious at best.

Thanks,
Bruce

 

[Brad Snyder]

As I suggested, if you want to darken the pavement in Lr, try the gradient tool, or the local adjustment brush. But, if you find PS tools to be tedious, these are likely to be worse. The edge masking is rudimentary at best.