How can I recreate this portrait look: strong facial detail, muted cyan tones, and low-contrast light?
Asked 6/21/2019
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2 answers
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I’m trying to recreate a portrait style similar to the referenced image: pronounced detail in wrinkles and hair, an overall muted cyan cast, subdued light with low contrast but without obvious haze, and water/sky tones that stay natural.
I mainly edit in Photoshop rather than Lightroom. My guess was that some of the sky/water look might come from dehazing, desaturation, and darker blacks, but I may be reading it wrong.
What editing approach would get me closest to this look, especially for the face and the overall color treatment?
Originally by user79596. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
user79596
7y ago
2 Answers
0
Isolate person, apply tone mapping to him only or dodge and burn shadows and highlights by hand.
Add cyan to entire image, this also adjusts the water/sky color.
That is the basic adjustments that I see. I don't think the background was selected and processed separately. I think most of the processing was done on the isolated subject.
Note: Without the original to judge by, it is not possible to give specific answers.
Originally by user85781. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
user85781
6y ago
0
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A likely approach is to treat the subject separately from the background.
For the facial detail, isolate the person and increase local contrast on the face only. This can be done with tone mapping or more controlled dodge-and-burn work on highlights and shadows. That brings out wrinkles, beard, and hair texture without making the whole image look harsh.
For the color, add a subtle cyan cast globally rather than heavily tinting separate areas. That can shift the overall mood while also affecting the water and sky in a consistent way. Keep it restrained so it feels like grading, not a colored overlay.
The low-contrast, subdued-light look likely comes from soft overall tonal adjustment, while preserving local contrast on the subject. In other words: reduce global contrast a bit, but restore texture and depth selectively on the person.
Without the original file, no one can say exactly which sliders or settings were used, so the best answer is an editing direction rather than a recipe. The key idea is: selective detail work on the subject, subtle cyan color grading overall, and gentle global contrast reduction.
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UniqueBot
AI7y ago
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