Pleasing skin tones - No Cyan?

Bendr

Hi! I just got my first order of prints, so i'm going through and trying to adjust skin-tones, and lo and behold they show 0% cyan! both magenta and yellow are in acceptable ranges, but it just doesn't make sense...

I'm using gimp, so i'm wondering if that has an effect, I don't think it should, but who knows...

example pic is here: http://bendr.smugmug.com/gallery/2020656/2/104705457



Any ideas?


Thanks,
Ben

jfriend

17-30% cyan already

Bendr wrote:

Hi! I just got my first order of prints, so i'm going through and trying to adjust skin-tones, and lo and behold they show 0% cyan! both magenta and yellow are in acceptable ranges, but it just doesn't make sense...

I'm using gimp, so i'm wondering if that has an effect, I don't think it should, but who knows...

example pic is here: http://bendr.smugmug.com/gallery/2020656/2/104705457



Any ideas?


Thanks,
Ben

Something is wrong with the way you are measuring the cyan because I see 17-30% cyan on the face in this image in Photoshop. Some tweaks can improve it a bit more, but it's already in an acceptable range.

Here's a slightly modified version where I added a little red and green in the mid-tones of the skin (how much to do here is personal taste), brightend the face a bit, used the healing brush on various skin blemishes, applied some light sharpening and cropped a little tighter:

Bendr

Ok, Thanks!!!

I had a feeling it had to do with gimp... I was noting that it was happening an awfull lot... now to find a way to do it...

It looks like my image can still use a bit of adjustment, i'll have to go back to the raw real quick...
and I hadn't thought of cloning out blemishes, that's a good idea

Thanks again!
Ben

edgework

Bendr wrote:

Hi! I just got my first order of prints, so i'm going through and trying to adjust skin-tones, and lo and behold they show 0% cyan! both magenta and yellow are in acceptable ranges, but it just doesn't make sense...

I'm using gimp, so i'm wondering if that has an effect, I don't think it should, but who knows...

example pic is here: http://bendr.smugmug.com/gallery/2020656/2/104705457



Any ideas?


Thanks,
Ben

Truth is, you have way too much cyan, which is why there is no highlight detail in the image. I'm reading 20+C and 40 or so M and Y.

I pulled down the cyan values in the red channel, and added some contast moves to bring out face detail. I'm reading 9C, 33M, 36Y in the cheek here, still not perfect but within skin tone range.

1andyw

Will you recommend a tutorial that teaches the approach you folks are using in this instance?

Thanks,

AndyW

jfriend

skin tone tutorial

1andyw wrote:

Will you recommend a tutorial that teaches the approach you folks are using in this instance?

You can start here: http://www.smugmug.com/help/skin-tone.

1andyw

Thank you, John. Excellent!