Why does one dark blue area in my product photo look black while the rest of the color looks correct?

Question

I’m shooting product photos under a couple of 5500K lights. In one image, part of the product that is actually navy blue appears almost black in the RAW file, while the rest of the scene looks color-correct. If I lower the white balance temperature a bit in Lightroom, I can bring that area back toward navy, but then the rest of the products shift and no longer look right.

Why would only part of an image show a color cast or loss of blue while the rest seems fine? I set white balance carefully in camera. Is this caused by the lighting, the camera profile, or something else? And is there an in-camera or lighting fix to prevent it?

user75526 · Answer

There may have been CRI issues. The lights are slightly yellowish, so have a relative deficit of blue. Since the hat is already dark, it doesn't reflect as much blue as you would have liked.

Your white balance may also have been off just enough to affect the appearance of the hat. Objects reflect and absorb light, so the lighting in the scene isn't quite the same as before objects were added. Try setting up the scene first. Then set custom white balance with the white reference placed directly over the hat.

Camera color profiles may have affect the appearance of the image. Some related questions:

For post processing, my approach was slightly different from yours. It might be easier than using an adjustment brush. I adjusted levels globally with color layer blending. Other colors in the scene were affected, but possibly by an acceptable amount.

Why does one dark blue area in my product photo look black while the rest of the color looks correct?

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