Fixing tungsten colour casts?

[Noz03]

I am trying to remove a horrible colour cast from a tungsten light on the hair and skin of a bunch of photos but I've tried a bunch of methods and can't seem to get rid of it completely without spending 15 minutes on each photo...

I've tried using hue and saturation adjustment and trying to hit the range then play around with sliders, but it took me 5 different adjustment layers and a lot of masking to get it just sort of ok... Using select colour range then colour balance was a lot faster to get rid of most of it but the hair colour doesn't look completely natural and there are still a lot of orange spots around.

Is there any other way?

Example:

 

[Tom Mann]

Do you have a good (ie, well color balanced), recent photo of the subject in normal, full-spectrum daylight that you could post? It's very difficult to tell the true color of his skin and hair from the single image you posted. Also, is the photo that you posted before or after your tweaks? Finally, if this is a "before" shot, can you post what you were able to achieve by tweaking that photo?

I ask because the exact method people might suggest depends on such details, what you consider a reasonable amount of spill from the tungsten source, etc.

Cheers,

Tom M

PS - One other question: Did you save raw versions of these images, not just in-camera JPG's?

 

[Tom Mann]

As a matter of curiosity, how was this photo lit, & what is the source of the tungsten spill? By any chance, is it the modeling light from a studio strobe?

Tom M

 

[Tom Mann]

By the way, without knowing the specifics, I should mention that a fairly standard method to handle mixed lighting like this is to shoot in RAW. Then, do two separate RAW conversions, each with a different white balance. One has the normal white balance, the other is white balanced for tungsten. Open up each of these two conversions in PS as separate layers, and then use a layer mask on the upper layer to select where you want its color balance to replace the color balance of the layer underneath.

You can try doing the same thing on a JPG version of the image, or inside of PS using the Camera Raw filter, but the results will never be as good as using ACR on a RAW capture of the scene.

Depending on the nature of the tungsten spill, you may need to do a lot of carefully done painting on the layer mask, but at least this method essentially guarantees that the two color extremes, the strobe WB and the tungsten WB will be correct.

HTH,

Tom M

 

[Tom Mann]

Even though I only had access to the JPG that you posted (ie, and not a RAW file, which would have worked much better and probably would have sped things up), I decided to give it a try using the two-ACR approach that I suggested, painting white on one of the layer masks.

This made a significant improvement, but I still had to tweak the brightness of the affected areas, as well as deal with a few spots in the hair in which the orange saturation was extreme. By the time I was done, it took about 15 minutes and I still wasn't done, just like you said, LOL.

Below is a GIF before-after animation. For fun, and to make it clear which was the "after" version, I spotted some of the minor blemishes.

Interesting ...

Tom M

 

[Noz03]

Even though I only had access to the JPG that you posted (ie, and not a RAW file, which would have worked much better and probably would have sped things up), I decided to give it a try using the two-ACR approach that I suggested, painting white on one of the layer masks.

This made a significant improvement, but I still had to tweak the brightness of the affected areas, as well as deal with a few spots in the hair in which the orange saturation was extreme. By the time I was done, it took about 15 minutes and I still wasn't done, just like you said, LOL.

Below is a GIF before-after animation. For fun, and to make it clear which was the "after" version, I spotted some of the minor blemishes.

Interesting ...

Tom M

Thanks Tom, yeah making two RAW conversions is a good idea that I'd never thought about. Will give that a go. The only thing is I have quite a lot of images to get through so 15 minutes each is going to equal to a fair few hours JUST on that light

To answer some of your questions: yes they are RAW images, shot around 200ISO with 2 softboxed speedlights either side of me and one bare behind for the background. The orange light was a tungsten lamp in the office I didn't notice above their heads until I got back to the computer, I don't have a perfectly balanced image but this image was balanced at 5500k so the area on the bottom left of his neck/chin should be relatively correct. I would also consider the amount you managed on the jpeg to be good enough. The other images I have worked on I just kept working and working until I got them right, although it was 15-30 minutes which is too long so I can get there, just not in a reasonable timing. I will give another shot at this very image now with some of your advice and see how it goes.

 

[Tom Mann]

Great!

Any chance you could post the RAW file for that image? I want to see how much difference there really is between starting with a RAW file and starting with a JPG. Usually, I don't have the motivation to do an actual comparison when I'm doing real work, so I just work with whatever is the best file format I have available. This thread would be a good motivator for me to do a real comparison.

Also, when you try the 2 ACR approach, don't forget to knock down the exposure a bit for the tungsten balanced conversion. The orange area in the hair is not only a different hue, it's also considerably brighter than the surrounding hair.

Cheers,

Tom M

PS - If you are OK with posting the RAW file for this image, most likely it will be too large for the forum upload software, so just put it in dropbox or yousendit.com, or someplace similar and just post the link.

PPS - BTW, I've forgotten to turn off all the regular lights in the studio too many times to count, LOL.

 

[Noz03]

Great!

Any chance you could post the RAW file for that image? I want to see how much difference there really is between starting with a RAW file and starting with a JPG. Usually, I don't have the motivation to do an actual comparison when I'm doing real work, so I just work with whatever is the best file format I have available. This thread would be a good motivator for me to do a real comparison.

Also, when you try the 2 ACR approach, don't forget to knock down the exposure a bit for the tungsten balanced conversion. The orange area in the hair is not only a different hue, it's also considerably brighter than the surrounding hair.

Cheers,

Tom M

PS - If you are OK with posting the RAW file for this image, most likely it will be too large for the forum upload software, so just put it in dropbox or yousendit.com, or someplace similar and just post the link.

PPS - BTW, I've forgotten to turn off all the regular lights in the studio too many times to count, LOL.

Hmm, so I am trying your method now with 2 different raw conversions but I don't quite get how you only select the orange parts of the hair? Because there are strands of hair that are reflecting more than others it seems almost impossible to do manually by hand (wacom tablet). So I the more I get rid of the orange the more I introduce blue to the parts that weren't reflecting. Maybe I misunderstood something?

And sure, I will send you the raw in a PM now

 

[Tom Mann]

Just FYI ... I saw your msgs, but won't be able to look at the raw file till tomorrow (is, Sat) morning (USA east coast time).

Tom M

 

[Tom Mann]

Hi Noz - I could only spend 5 or 10 minutes on the NEF because everything is hopping here in Washington, DC (for obvious reasons, LOL).

Anyway, my initial impression is that the tungsten spill light seems to be almost as hard to correct starting with the NEF file as it was starting from the JPG. My impression is that it may be a bit easier in that a good color correction seems to extend over a bit wider brightness range when using the NEF, but it certainly does not make the problem easy, by any means.

I'll be back late this afternoon or tonight and we can talk more.

Cheers,

Tom M

 

[Noz03]

Hi Noz - I could only spend 5 or 10 minutes on the NEF because everything is hopping here in Washington, DC (for obvious reasons, LOL).

Anyway, my initial impression is that the tungsten spill light seems to be almost as hard to correct starting with the NEF file as it was starting from the JPG. My impression is that it may be a bit easier in that a good color correction seems to extend over a bit wider brightness range when using the NEF, but it certainly does not make the problem easy, by any means.

I'll be back late this afternoon or tonight and we can talk more.

Cheers,

Tom M

Hey, no problem at all. I've actually pretty much finished most of them now anyway. Actually couldn't get your method to work for me but seem to be going ok.

The method I am using is to select the colour range then use that to mask a colour balance over a duplicate, then mask that duplicate over the original where needed. Then add a few hue adjustments, with its built in colour range targeting system to clear up any missed spots or slight leftover colour casts. With that I'd say in 5-10 minutes I get them just about perfect. I will post a few before and afters in a little bit.

 

[Noz03]

Finally finished them all... Jeez... I will never make that mistake again.... Probably added about 3 hours to my job

Anyway in case you are interested here are some before/after, the blonde guy isn't quite perfect but luckily most of the images weren't so bad as that one so I think it should be fine.

 

[Tom Mann]

Hey, Noz - The attachments didn't show up. I'd love to see them. Could you try posting them again?

Thanks,

Tom M

 

[Noz03]

Oh, thats weird. Trying again.