Quick Tip – Apply Pro Photo Effects with Photoshop CS6′s Color Lookup Adjustment

Did you know you can apply photo effects in seconds with Photoshop CS6? The new Color Lookup adjustment is a great way to quickly add professional photo effects without actions or other adjustment layers. This Photoshop quick tip will show you how you can manipulate this tool to apply awesome film effects to your photos.

What is the Color Lookup adjustment?

The Color Lookup adjustment (new in CS6) is a hidden gem; one of the best features for photographers but also the least known. This adjustment is more well known in the video editing industry where it is used to simulate the colors of films, screens, and other devices. Photographers can make use of this adjustment to apply quick and professional photo effects to their photos.

You can get access this adjustments in the Adjustments palette (Window > Adjustments). Select the Color Lookup adjustment then click on any of the 3 dropdown menus to pick the color profiles you’d like to use.

 
Color Lookup Adjustment

 
Photoshop comes with 32 color profiles

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Our favorite color profiles

Here are some of our favorite color profiles that we think works well with photos.

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2 and 3 Strip

This process gives your photos a retro color look frequently seen in movies from the 1920-1950s. You’ll find this effect used in movies such as The Aviator (2004), The Wizard of Oz (1939), and The Adventures of Robin Hood (1938).

 
First Technicolor camera from the 1930s

 
Comparison of 2 Strip and 3 Strip Technicolor

 
2 and 3 Strip color profiles in the Color Lookup properties panel

 
2 Strip Technicolor

 
3 Strip Technicolor

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RedBlueYellow and TealMagentaGold

These two color profiles changes from RGB (Red, Green, Blue) to Red Blue Yellow and Teal Magenta Gold. They’re great for creating retro photo effects similar to the ones you’d find in Instagram and many retro Photoshop actions – except now you can create the look with just one adjustment!

 
Comparison of RGB, RBY, and TMG

 
RedBlueYellow and TealMagentaGold in the Color Lookup properties panel

 
Red Blue Yellow

 
Teal Magenta Gold

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FuturisticBleak and AnimePalette

These two color profiles are great for creating a low-vibrancy photo effect. Futuristic Bleak lowers the vibrancy of the colors and darkens the white slightly. The Anime Palette looks a little similar but leaves the brightness of the whites alone and has more vibrant blues and greens. 
Comparison of Futuristic Bleak and Anime Palette

 
FuturisticBleak and AnimePalette in the Color Lookup properties panel

 
Futuristic Bleak

 
Anime Palette

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Duotones

Under the abstract dropdown menu, you can find many two tone color profiles.

 
Comparison of duotone color profiles

 
Duotone color profiles in the properties panel

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How are color profiles different?

Color profiles transform a range of input colors into another and this means that you get:

• consistent effect throughout multiple photos.
• genuine look without artifacts caused processing beyond the images tonal and color range
• photo effects that cannot be created in any other ways

Quick Tip: Access the Hidden Photographic Toning Gradients in Photoshop CS6

Want a quick way to tone or split-tone your photos? Photoshop CS6 comes preloaded with photographer-created Gradient Map presets but they’re hidden somewhere inside Photoshop. Read this tutorial and find out where to find them and how to use them to create a professional split-toning effect. A printable toning presets chart is also included for you to use as a reference.

The Photographic Toning Effects

Photoshop CS6 comes loaded with 39 presets to simulate traditional darkroom toning and split-toning effects. Click on the image to download the high-res version you can print.

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Step 1

Open an image you want to split tone in Photoshop. For this tutorial, we’ll be using the image below as an example.

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Step 2

Add a new Gradient Map adjustment layer. You can do this by clicking on the Gradient Map fill layer button in the Adjustments panel (Window > Adjustments).

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Step 3

In the Properties panel (Window > Properties), click on the Gradient. This will bring up the Gradient Editor.

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Step 4

This is where the photographic toning presets are hidden. Click on the panel menu located on the top-right of the presets area then select Photographic Toning.

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Step 5

Try out the different gradients to find the one that you like. Most of them will look pretty strong, but we’ll minimize this in the next step.

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Step 6

One way to reduce the look of it is to add a Black and White adjustment layer (Layer > New Adjustment Layer > Black & White). Position this layer between the two layers then adjust the opacity of your Gradient Map. Here’s what ours look like with the Gradient Map at 50%.

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Final Results

Medical Imaging with DICOM files

DICOM is the industry standard format for medical scans. Learn how DICOM files are used with Adobe Photoshop CS3 Extended to create animations and measurements.

Opening DICOM Files

To open DICOM files, open the File menu and choose Open. Browse for the DICOM file and click Open.

Once you click Open, a window will appear with settings you can modify.

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Options

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Frames

On the left, you can select which frame to view and open. To open a single frame, select the frame and click open. To select more than one, hold the CTRL key and click. To select all the frames, click the Select All button.

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DICOM Dataset Options

There are two options in this area you can modify

Anonymize

Checking this option will anonymize the file by replacing all patients metadata with "anonymize".

Show Overlays

If your file has overlays such as annotations, curves, or text, you can check this box to display those overlays.

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Windowing

Windowing lets you adjust the brightness and contrast of the image. To view all the Windowing options, check the Show Windowing Options checkbox located below the image.

Presets

There are 5 presets you can choose from:

• Default
• Lung
• Bone
• Abdomen
• Full

Manual Adjustments

Or, you can manually adjust the settings using your mouse:

1. Click on the  button to select the Window Level tool.
2. Click on the middle of the image and drag the tool up or down to adjust the level.
3. Drag the tool left or right to adjust the width.

Reverse Image

To reverse the image, simply check the Reverse Image checkbox.

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Frame Import Options

This area lets you choose how you would like to open the images.

Import frames as layers

This option will import frames into layers. This option is useful for manipulating the image or creating an animation.

N-up Configuration

This option will tile the frames onto one layer. Select this option if you would like to print the frames onto transparencies.

Creating an Animation

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Step 1

Open a DICOM file. Open the File menu and select Open. Browse for a DICOM file (.dc3, .dcm, .dic, or no extension) and click OK

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Step 2

Press the Select All button to select all the frames. In the Frame Import Options, choose Import frames as layers. Apply any other settings needed then click OK.

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Step 3

You should now have each frame as layers. Select all the layers by pressing Alt+Ctrl+A or going into the Select menu and choosing All Layers.

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Step 4

Open the Animation window by going into the Window menu and selecting Animation.

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Step 5

In the Animation pallet, click on the  button located near the top right to open the flyout menu. In the flyout menu, select Make Frames From Layers.

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Step 6

If the Animation window is not in Frame view, press the  button to convert the animation into a frame animation. If it’s already in frame view, you can skip this step.

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Step 7

Now we need to set how many times it should loop. Click on the bottom right menu to select how the animation should loop. To have the animation loop forever, select Forever.

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Step 8

To save the animation as an animated GIF file, use the Save for Web & Devices tool. To open the Save for Web & Devices tool, press Shift+Ctrl+S or open the File menu and select Save for Web & Devices. In the Save for Web & Devices tool, Select a GIF preset and modify the settings if necessary. Click the Save button when you are ready to save.

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Final Results

Automating Actions to Save Time

Want to save some time so you’re not doing repetitive things in Adobe Photoshop? Look no further than the Actions palette. Let’s say you to need to adjust settings, add a filter, resize, or any of the other many options in Photoshop to a large number of photos. Instead of having to go through each photo one at a time, applying effects, resizing, or adjusting levels for example, it’s much easier to edit one photo and record the actions. Then, we can apply that action to an entire folder of images.

Preview of Final Results

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Automating Actions Photoshop Tutorials

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Step 1

Go ahead and get a bunch of photos and place them into a folder. Open one of the photos in Photoshop. Select one which we’ll edit and record the changes for the action. Go to Window>Actions to open the Actions palette.

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Step 2

Click the Create New Action icon on the bottom of the Actions palette.

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Step 3

Name is “Black and White Thumbnail” and click Record. There are some other options, such as assigning a Function Key or changing the set of actions it’s placed, but leave those for this example as we don’t want to assign a function key and want to keep it in the default actions set.

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Step 4

Everything we do next will be recorded as a step in the action. While there are many ways to convert an image to black and white, such as going to Image>Adjustments>Black and White, let’s do a simple desaturation for this example. Go to Image>Adjustments>Hue/Saturation and drag the saturation to the left and click OK.

Step 5

Go to Image>Image Resize and change the Height to 200. As long as the Constrain Proportions is checked, the Width should resize automatically. Click OK.

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Step 6

Now that it’s black and white and resized to a thumbnail, we need to add a border. Double-click the Background layer in the Layers palette and click OK to make it a normal layer that we can apply layer styles to. Go to Layer>Layer Style>Stroke. Change the Position to Inside, the Size to 2 and click OK.

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Step 7

Now we need to save it with certain settings. Go to File>Save As and save it as a JPEG to a new folder named Thumbnails. Finally, click the Stop Playing/Recording icon on the bottom of the Actions palette. Now we have created an action that converted a color image to a black and white, resizes it to a thumbnail, adds a 2-point interior stroke, and then saves it as a JPEG. Close the file and don’t save changes so we don’t erase the original file.

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Step 8

Now that we’ve created the action titled Black and White Thumbnail, go to File>Automate>Batch. Set the Action to Black and White Thumbnail. Click the Choose button near the source folder setting and find and select the folder of images to apply the action to. Click the Choose button near the Destination folder setting and find and select the folder to save the thumbnail images to. I set the source folder to one called Photos and I set the destination folder to one called Thumbnails. Also make sure to check Override Action “Save As” Commands since we already have a save command in the action.

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Step 9

Now all seven photos from the source folder, originally full color and large size, have been saved as black and white thumbnails with a border in a separate folder. Remember, instead of editing photos one at time, when we want to edit many of them with the same effects, try actions instead.