DIY Photography

Your one stop shop for everything photo-video

  • News
  • Inspiration
  • Reviews
  • Tutorials
  • DIY
  • Gear
Search

Submit A Story

Take your photo’s colours to the next level with split toning

Jan 31, 2018 by John Aldred 2 Comments

  • Share
  • Tweet
  • Flipboard
  • WhatsApp

I have kind of a love-hate relationship with split toning. I love the work I see others doing with it, but for me, it never really gives me what I want. I guess I need more practice. But Evan Ranft (formerly, Evan 5ps) has a handy little tutorial for dealing with split toning in Adobe Lightroom. The technique should work exactly the same way in Adobe Camera Raw, too.

Evan says the main advantage of split toning for him is that it allows him to give his images a great look without having to dive deep into colour channel adjustments. They also help to give a consistent and uniform feel between multiple images, even when the originals are vastly different. And they can be applied fairly quickly, too.

The split toning panel is fairly simple, consisting of just five sliders. The top two control the hue and saturation of the highlights, the bottom two control the hue and saturation of the shadows, and the slider in the middle alters the balance of the two.

You’ll note in the screenshot above that there are two grey boxes next to the “Highlights” and “Shadows” labels. Clicking on those will bring up a dialogue that lets you visually click and drag around to alter the colour and see the change in real-time on your image. Evan begins by setting the colour for his highlights. He picks a blueish colour, with a medium saturation.

He then goes onto tone the shadows, favouring a hue on the opposite side of the colour wheel to that which he used for his highlights. These opposite colours often work very well to compliment each other.

Finally, he adjusts the balance slider. Moving the slider to the left increases the strength of the shadow colour throughout the image. Moving it to the right does the same for the highlights.

So, it’s just a case of finding a balance that works for you. It ultimately boils down to personal taste. You might even find that once you’ve set your balance you want to make further tweaks to the highlight and shadow colours slightly, too. Ultimately resulting in a look that pleases you.

From here, once you’ve got split tone settings you’re happy with, you can simply copy and paste the setting to other images, or you can make a preset.

I still can’t get Lightroom or ACR’s split toning to work for me. I prefer to do it in Photoshop with a curves adjustment. But, maybe I just need more practice.

FIND THIS INTERESTING? SHARE IT WITH YOUR FRIENDS!

  • Share
  • Tweet
  • Flipboard
  • WhatsApp

Related posts:

Lightroom for iOS 2.1 adds live filters, point curves and split toning Adobe unveils Lightroom 2.0 for Android, complete with RAW shooting/editing, Dehaze and Split Toning Adobe brings a major features to Lightroom CC including tone curve and split toning Take your photos to the next level with Lightroom’s luminosity and colour masks

Filed Under: Tutorials Tagged With: Adobe Camera Raw, Evan 5ps, Evan Ranft, lightroom, Split Tone

John Aldred: from diyphotography.net

About John Aldred

John Aldred is a photographer with over 20 years of experience in the portrait and commercial worlds. He is based in Scotland and has been an early adopter - and occasional beta tester - of almost every digital imaging technology in that time. As well as his creative visual work, John uses 3D printing, electronics and programming to create his own photography and filmmaking tools and consults for a number of brands across the industry.

« This photographer built her own DIY ultra large format camera from scratch
Zion National Park will allow tripods on some trails after all »

Submit A Story

Get our FREE Lighting Book

DIYP lighting book cover

* download requires newsletter signup
DIYPhotography

Recent Comments

Free Resources

Advanced lighting book

Recent Posts

  • Here’s a bullet time video booth you can build yourself
  • Ricoh has discontinued the HD PENTAX-DA 21mm F3.2AL Limited silver lens
  • This “stellar flower” unravels the twilight’s evolution in 360 degrees
  • Strobes vs Continuous LEDs – Which is right for you?
  • Wave goodbye to Apple’s My Photo Stream next month

Udi Tirosh: from diyphotography.netUdi Tirosh is an entrepreneur, photography inventor, journalist, educator, and writer based in Israel. With over 25 years of experience in the photo-video industry, Udi has built and sold several photography-related brands. Udi has a double degree in mass media communications and computer science.

Alex Baker: from diyphotography.netAlex Baker is a portrait and lifestyle driven photographer based in Valencia, Spain. She works on a range of projects from commercial to fine art and has had work featured in publications such as The Daily Mail, Conde Nast Traveller and El Mundo, and has exhibited work across Europe

David Williams: from diyphotography.netDave Williams is an accomplished travel photographer, writer, and best-selling author from the UK. He is also a photography educator and published Aurora expert. Dave has traveled extensively in recent years, capturing stunning images from around the world in a modified van. His work has been featured in various publications and he has worked with notable brands such as Skoda, EE, Boeing, Huawei, Microsoft, BMW, Conde Nast, Electronic Arts, Discovery, BBC, The Guardian, ESPN, NBC, and many others.

John Aldred: from diyphotography.netJohn Aldred is a photographer with over 20 years of experience in the portrait and commercial worlds. He is based in Scotland and has been an early adopter - and occasional beta tester - of almost every digital imaging technology in that time. As well as his creative visual work, John uses 3D printing, electronics and programming to create his own photography and filmmaking tools and consults for a number of brands across the industry.

Dunja Djudjic: from diyphotography.netDunja Djudjic is a multi-talented artist based in Novi Sad, Serbia. With 15 years of experience as a photographer, she specializes in capturing the beauty of nature, travel, and fine art. In addition to her photography, Dunja also expresses her creativity through writing, embroidery, and jewelry making.

Copyright © DIYPhotography 2006 - 2023 | About | Contact | Advertise | Write for DIYP | Full Disclosure | Privacy Policy