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Color Correcting Images With Variations

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Whether you are a blogger, e-tailer, or beauty enthusiast, having color-correct photos is probably important to you. Certain types of light can cause a color cast, and it can really throw the overall color of the image off. A lot of cameras try to prevent color casts with white balance options, but it doesn’t always work as well as it should. With these photos, color correction in photo editing programs can help tremendously. Previously, I walked through a Curves adjustment tutorial. Today, I will do the same with the Variations tool.

Please note that I am using Photoshop CS4 for this walk-through. If you have an earlier or more recent version, it should be fairly easy to tweak these instructions.

The first step for color correcting this image is to decide how to make this adjustment the least destructive to the original image as possible. The Variations adjustment is not available as an adjustment layer, so any changes you make through this tool will be applied directly onto the original image. The only way to undo and/or tweak the adjustment would be to step backward (command+option+Z; ctrl+alt+Z) and redo the adjustment. It can quickly become a huge was of time. Luckily, Photoshop has a utility that will prevent this issue completely: smart objects. A smart object will store all of the adjustments applied to it to a separate sub-layer. So, before starting your color correction, turn it into a smart object.

Picture 2 Color Correcting Images With Variations

After converting your layer into a smart object, a lot of adjustments will not be available for use anymore. That is because those adjustments have separate adjustment layers, so there is no reason to use them on smart objects. Image–>Adjustments—>Variations.

Picture 3 Color Correcting Images With Variations

A large palette will open, and that is where all your work will take place. Your original image will be surrounded by modified versions of your image:

Picture 4 Color Correcting Images With Variations

The adjusted images surrounding your original image are previews of what your photo will look like with that modification. The images are placed in this order with the digital color wheel in mind.

color wheel 300x300 Color Correcting Images With Variations

If you compare the color wheel to the images in the panel, you will notice that the colors are in the same location. This makes it very easy to find the complementary colors for adjustments. The reason there are no “less” options for these modifications, it is because adding a color’s complement is the same as removing that color. If you add more red to the picture, you will be, at the same time, removing some cyan from your images.

Most of your work will be done with the midtones, but feel free to tinker with the highlights and shadows, just to see what happens. I prefer to adjust saturation with the hue/saturation adjustment, so I rarely visit that tab.

Once you have identified the shade of the color cast, you can intuitively take steps toward removing the cast. If your color cast is blue, adding more yellow will move you closer to a corrected image. You will always have your original image visible at the top of the panel beside your current pick.

On the right side of the panel, you have the option of adjust the brightness of your image. Again, I prefer an adjustment layer for this. Variations is not the best tool for that type of adjustment.

The great thing about the Variations tool is how intuitive it is. Once you determine what is wrong with your photo, you can easily remedy it with Variations without anything too confusing. Hopefully you have a better grasp on what this awesome tool can do for your images. Good luck, and happy editing!


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