Desaturation - your examples please

whiterice

Just curious to learn why a photographer would desaturate a photo in PP.

I've used PS for a few years and am just now experimenting with saturation and desaturation.

Do you use this for color correction or for artistic reasons, or both?! I'd really be interested to see any examples.

Thanks in advance for helping this noob.

TonyCooper

whiterice wrote:

Just curious to learn why a photographer would desaturate a photo in PP.

I've used PS for a few years and am just now experimenting with saturation and desaturation.

Do you use this for color correction or for artistic reasons, or both?! I'd really be interested to see any examples.

Thanks in advance for helping this noob.

"Artistic reasons" seems to be a bit pretentious at my level of photography, but I will sometimes desaturate part of an image and leave part of the image in color in order emphasize what I think is the essential part of the image. To do this, of course, requires a little practice with a Layer Mask.

TonyCooper

You asked about simple desaturation, and I gave you examples of partial desaturation. Sometimes I have an image where I can't make up my mind whether it is better in color or better in black and white. Here's an example. This was taken in a place where the owner let me photograph some objects, but didn't want me rearranging things. I had to take the background clutter as it was.

Jwar

I'm with Tony, I use desaturation for artistic reasons to focus on a subject.

Richard

I frequently do local desaturation to reduce background distractions when I am shooting on the street. Those damn red no entry signs seem to be everywhere and they are easy to overlook when you're focused on something else. If I have done my job properly, you wouldn't notice the effect when viewing the pic.

As for selective color, I use it only rarely. When I do, I don't actually desaturate, but rather do a channel-based B&W conversion and then mask out the part I want in color. It is far easier to control local contrast that way.


Partly desaturated portraits are all the rage these days. I don't have a lot of personal experience with this style, but again, I think you get better artistic control if instead of desaturating you use a masked B&W conversion layer and tweak its opacity.

eminart

I, personally, only use desaturation when I want something partially desaturated. A partially desaturated photo can give a certain feel......... maybe antique, or soft light, or almost like sepia, or ........ I don't know it's hard to explain.

However, if you are going to completely desaturate, you'll be better off using a B&W conversion layer. It gives you much more control.

JustPlainMe

eminart wrote:

I, personally, only use desaturation when I want something partially desaturated. A partially desaturated photo can give a certain feel......... maybe antique, or soft light, or almost like sepia, or ........ I don't know it's hard to explain.

However, if you are going to completely desaturate, you'll be better off using a B&W conversion layer. It gives you much more control.

This is fairly important. I don't know why the partially desaturated photos are so popular right now, I find they often look too soft. I'm all for going one way or the other, though at times, there may be a good reason to use it. I do find myself leaning in the direction of specialized actions---sepia, antique, vintage---so I add texture as well as the color effect.

I never use ONLY the saturation slider for a B&W conversion. Even in Elements, I can get a better balance using the levels sliders. There are also a lot of free B&W conversion actions out there that give you great results.

For me, in Photoshop Elements, the saturation slider comes into play if I'm trying to match or change a color, say, to change the color of a piece of clothing or something in the background. It's a different process in PSCS vs. PSE, I don't know the PSCS workflow.

But in general, the saturation slider can lead to dull B&W (on the left) and bright, overblown, cartoon-y colors (on the right). In my beginning days I used the saturation slider instead of understanding brightness, contrast, shadows, and highlights. Quite a few of my early jpegs are now oversaturated (or under) and I can't get them back.

Sarah

arodney

captnemo

Here's an example where I desautrated a portrait- it softens the image and hides subtle flaws. (the client liked the results)

whiterice

Wow guys, thanks. This is very helpful.

I never thought to selectively desaturate, but it makes so much sense.

whiterice

Jwar wrote:

I'm with Tony, I use desaturation for artistic reasons to focus on a subject.

What a great image Jay, thanks for sharing.

whiterice

TonyCooper wrote:

You asked about simple desaturation, and I gave you examples of partial desaturation. Sometimes I have an image where I can't make up my mind whether it is better in color or better in black and white. Here's an example. This was taken in a place where the owner let me photograph some objects, but didn't want me rearranging things. I had to take the background clutter as it was.

What a great way to emphasize your subject...works really well here Tony.

raptorcaptor

Here are some samples where I used desat for effect.

pathfinder

If you watch the lighting in a stage production, the lighting on the main subject is usually brighter, more intense than on the background or the secondary figures. This is not an accident....

You can accomplish this kind of emphasis, with separate strobe lighting in the studio when you shoot flash. Brighter on the subject, than the background.

Likewise, you can select the background in Photoshop, and desaturate it or flatten the luminosity curve to de-emphasize the background relative to the main subject, or do both. I do this not infrequently.

Here is a little girl whose color is slightly more intense than the colorful green background behind her.