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Gradient Maps

Lesson 12 from: Transform Your Images with Color Grading

Lindsay Adler

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Lesson Info

12. Gradient Maps

Lesson Info

Gradient Maps

ingredient maps are is another tool that is an adjustment layer in photo shop. So bottom right hand corner again, half moon cookie and you go grading maps. Okay. What the Grady int map does is it maps certain colors to certain certain shadows and highlights in the photos. So when I hit this, it brings up a little adjustment layer. I'm going to double click on this map, and all of these are different ways to tone this photo. So as I click through, obviously many of them look really crazy. However, this is because it's just applying the color on top. I haven't changed capacity or the blend mode. So right now this is just color toning sitting above our file. It's not interacting with the shadows and highly, so it doesn't look real. So what I'm gonna do is real quick. I'm gonna change that. I'm gonna go back. We're gonna were gonna mess with the ingredient map that I'm choosing in a minute. But I can't tell what the heck's going on when it's just colors over top. So I'm gonna back off my c...

apacity a little bit. Maybe something to their cause, not Look, you can see what it's doing, whereas at 100% I can't really see how it's toning at times. I'll also try it on softly cause watch. You know it's it's adding this warmth and I couldn't tell that before. So let's just do I'm gonna just do regular for now, just normal, and I'm gonna put out, like, 30%. So now let me go back and take a look what these are doing. So here's what its spelling out the ones that you have by default. Okay, I'm just picking this top one. What it's saying is, if you look it telling me on the left hand side seal and then top, there's the black black icon Little black box, and in the bottom right there's a little white. So basically saying is whoever is black on the left hand side. Wevers a shadow. Give it that color and the right hand side. Whatever is a highly over on the right hand side. Give it that close. So what is doing is it's giving me warrant like pinkish to the shadows and then give me white to the highlights. That's what this one says, but let's say I pick another one. So here's what saying here it's saying, Give me blue to the shadows but then kind of fade into red in the mid tones and then give me yellow in the highlights. And so, in different photos like this looks like it would never work. It works good. Uh, works well, when you're doing something outdoors, it's kind of flat lit. And you want to have a vintage feel. You can actually get this toe look quite nice. And it totally depends on the photo. Um, these by default. If you if you're trying this at home, you would just get this top row. You don't actually see all of these because I don't know why they're not preloaded. Who knows? But by default, you goto by default, you don't see them. So what you need to do is you click on the little, uh would you call it the little gear that's in there? And then these are all ones that air in photo shop. But this they're not preloaded. You have to actually hit them to load them as options. So there's color harmonies. Remember how we talked about analogous colors in the beginning? Everything in a similar place on the color wheel. That's what the color harmonies one and two are. So this is gonna load it. I'm a pending. It's adding on the bottom. And so it's like it says these are all similar. They blend into each other, and so I can tone all the way across the debts was doing its mapping it to different areas of the photo and some getting different previous. Like I kind of like that one. That one looks like kind of antique and pretty. And of course, I can go in any of these and change the colors. So if I click on this little icon, I go into color and I could make it whatever I want. Look, all of these things I can change and you can actually split. Remember the little you can split them to change the blend from one color to the other. The point of this is, is if you go to the gear. There's a lot of things that aren't showing that work really well, and the one that you want to do first is photographic toning, because that's what it's intended for. So photographic toning. We'll just give you like it'll give you a sepia like if you wanted to try a more natural looking c P A. Because the way that I usually do CBO is that you know that color rise I mentioned before new saturation. But it just washes over the whole photo. It doesn't look right here. It looks much better cause it's mapping different colors to the shadows and highlights. So anyway, this is what it's intended for. And then at any point, let's say I got this blue and I mapped it. I can also back it off of the highlight so I can actually drag it off. So it's not affecting certain parts of the photo where I can blend it. So it's not affecting certain parts of the photo or I can change the color of it. If I wanted to be yellow, or I can get rid of one of these points by dragging it off like there's I just click around. I click around so there's something I like and I could make a change. So I like this one, and I'm gonna try it on soft light. And so here's what it did. Just added a little warmth to the face and cool down the background a bit with a little more contrast. So to summarize that one, go to your half moon cookie, go to Grady Int map by default. It gives you just something random. Click on the colors, and you're going to make sure you click on your gear to load some more options. Notice. There's pastel there spectrums, the whole bunch of things you can add. It hit upend, because what it does if you don't. If you just hit OK, it overwrites all the rest of them. I'm gonna offend as it onto the bottom. Aiken, select any of these colors, but of course I can't see what the heck's going on so you can back off your opacity, change your blend mode, and then I can go back. And I can continuously change this. By the way, if you come up with your own formula, you like say, Oh, I like this, but I want the color to be more in the yellows, and you like that better. You can save it so you can create your own your own Grady in math and then apply it to other photos so I can save it. Name it. Whatever I want have that access. So so far, we did curves for color grading color Look up tables. Selective color, Solid color with blend if you saturation ingredient maps all in photo shop. Each one has their pros and cons, but they all like they're all kind of doing variations of the same thing. So which one were, you know? I mean, you got to figure out which one you like best. Just a quick question. Not sure if you said this for this is from taxi. Can you invert the ingredients? I'm sure you can. I don't know how, but I'm sure you can. With DeCherney perverse beneath the to the right. Uh ah, yeah, that would totally work. Tennessee? Yeah, makes perfect sense. Oh, and by the way, what dither is sometimes when you when you're picking these colored by, Thank you. Sometimes when you are doing these colors, if ever see if you add like a blue and sometimes you see banding, you add a color. So what dither does is add just a little bit of grain and it breaks it up so you don't see the banding so if you ever see it, you're seeing those lines and you like the color hit dither, and it just it adds a little bit of texture to break that up.

Ratings and Reviews

Sean
 

Fantastic course. Lindsay Adler is a such a photography Rock Star. She can do it all, shooting in and out of study, lighting, posing, teaching and very amazing, Photoshop guru. Thanks for getting Lindsay, in the beginning I never knew that she was so skilled in all these aspects. As you progress in your photography, you learn lighting, skin tones and white balance, then skin retouching, then you learn color grading and analogous colors, complimentary colors, color triads, etc. Color Grading is so key to that final polished and "expensive" look. Lindsay did a terrific job teaching this course. I watched it 3 to 4 times to really pick up how to use these tools. Lindsay is a phenomenal teacher and photographer. Thanks for getting her Creativelive.

Elizabeth Haen
 

This is a great class to learn many options for color grading images. Lindsay gives comprehensive options for use in both LIghtroom and Photoshop. She has a style of teaching that is easy to follow and does an excellent job of summarizing each technique after introducing it to help the process sink in fully before she moves on. I love how she goes over everything she does thoroughly in a way that clearly explains each step without assuming everyone knows what she is doing. There is never a time when I thought "wait, what did she just do there?!:". Just really great information that is well taught.

David Babcock
 

Awesome class - Lindsay is a wonderful teacher. It might be nice to have a list of the equipment used, I had to go back a couple of times to find all of what Lindsay was using. Excellent and well done!!

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