Removing Tints

posted by Liz

I've been working on a project for the tutorials, so I haven't put one up in a while. But after attending a Photoshop CS3 workshop with Adam recently, I learned an amazing technique for color correction by Scott Kelby and Dave Cross, so I thought I would share it with you all.

Watch the video to see the process and check the written instructions below for clarification on what I'm doing.



Steps:
1. With your photo open, make a copy of the image by dragging the image layer to the New Layer button. Then go to the Adjustment Layer button at the bottom of the Layers palette and choose Threshold.

2. Move the slider all the way to the left and slowly slide it back until some dark spots appear. Shift+click on it to mark it with a 1. [Update: Due to some confusion, I want to clarify that you should click on the areas that appear in the document, not on the slider in the Threshold window.]

3. Now move the slider all the way to the right and slowly slide it back until some white spots appear. Shift+click to mark it with a 2.

4. Cancel Threshold. Your markers will temporarily disappear.

5. Go to Curves (Command+M) and first select the black point eyedropper. Click on the #1 marker with it.

6. Now select the white point eyedropper and click on the #2 marker. Click OK.

7. Make a new layer, go to Edit>Fill and choose 50% Gray from the "Use" drop-down menu. Set the blending mode to Difference in the Layers palette.

8. Open up Threshold again, move the slider all the way to the left and start sliding it slowly back to the right until you see white spots. Mark it with Shift+click and then cancel Threshold.

9. Delete the grey layer.

10. Open Curves again, select the grey point eyedropper and click on the #3 marker. Done.

Tips:
1. To get the crosshairs view of the Eyedropper Tool while you're using Threshold, turn on Caps Lock.

2. To zoom in while in Threshold, press Command+Spacebar to temporarily activate the Zoom Tool.