Colour Cast/ Balance - Please help!

[JaxD]

I'm quite new to photoshop and am trying to understand how to correct colour balance/ colour cast. I took this photo of my kids at dusk on our deck where they were lit by the deck lamps (and fill flash) and I want to correct the yellow colour cast. I've been reading a lot online and following some tutorials so for this one, I used a levels adjustment layer on the blue channel and moved the right slider to the left.

What I would like to know is did I use the right method? Are the skin tones correct? Is there anything else I should do colour-wise to improve it? I know its not the best picture technically but I love their smiles (Its so hard to capture both of them smiling naturally!) and I like the yellow light from the lamp hitting their hair.

I've included the original for comparison.

(Also meant to add that I usually shoot in RAW and find it quite easy to correct the WB in Camera Raw but I only have a jpeg of this shot.)

Thank you in advance for sharing your wisdom and experience!

Original:



My attempt at correction:

[teaking]

Theres no right or wrong way to correct colour balance, theres so many options. You can use colour balance, hue saturation, curves, levels its which ever feels best.

From a retouching point of view you may want to try desaturating the reds just a little bit to soften the redness in the skin.

[edbayani]

yes. so many ways to do color correction. but you're on the right track. try this one. with levels, you will notice that the right slider is not in the right place, move it to the left where the histogram (the mountain range} starts to rise. this will correct the white point and will lighten it a bit. click on the left eyedropper of levels and click on the black band of your daughter's dress where the arm of your son and daughter, intersect. this will correct the color and you can fine tune by doing what you did with the blue channel.
it would be easier f there was a neutral color (gray) in the image so you can click it with the middle eyedropper of levels. experiment with what teaking mentioned and see what happens and which seems easier for you.
your 'after' photo is still a little bit reddish. try the hue and saturation.

[JaxD]

Thank you both for your informative replies. I can see now that its still a bit red. Edbayani, I'll try again using your suggestions. I appreciate the help. Thanks!

[Krusty79]

This may be review for you, but here's a tutorial on using Levels and the eyedroppers:

Levels: Getting the Professional 'Pop'

[autofocus]

After you make your levels adjustment as noted above by the poster you can try this: Pick Selective Color. It will open with the red channel open..drag the black slider on the bottom to the left until the color lightens up some. You may also want to now go to the yellow channel (choose it at top of box) and do the same thing with the black slider there...backing sliders to the left will reduce the intensity, while moving them to the right will increase the intensity. I did a quickie edit on your photo, and that technique seemed to work well

Vinnie

[JaxD]

Thanks so much for that tip, autofocus. I gave it a try now and it really made a difference. I've never used the selective colour adjustment before so will make that my subject to learn about today..

Krusty79, thanks for the tutorial tip.. I'll check it out.

[autofocus]

Originally Posted by JaxD

Thanks so much for that tip, autofocus. I gave it a try now and it really made a difference. I've never used the selective colour adjustment before so will make that my subject to learn about today..

Krusty79, thanks for the tutorial tip.. I'll check it out.

You're very welcome..happy to help out