Color Enhancement Of A Flower Close Up

This close-up photo was taken by myself weeks ago. The color composition look interesting, the yellow flower is surrounded by purple leaves. However, the contrast of this photo need some improvements. In this tutorial I will show you how to adjust the contrast of a photo.

Before

@ 210mm, ISO-400, 1/60 sec, f4.8
[ Photo by favorizer.net / cc by-sa 2.0 / bigger size ]

After

After the color adjustment.
[ Edited by favorizer.net / cc by-sa 2.0 / bigger size ]

[ This tutorial is for The GIMP, you may apply similar steps in Photoshop ]

STEP 1

As usual, click on the “Duplicate Layer” icon at the bottom of the Layers Dialog to duplicate a layer from the original image & keep the original image as it is.

STEP 2

Select layer “L1″ & call up the “Levels” dialog ( Menu : Colors > Levels ). Move the left slider until it reach the underneath of the graph. In fact, this improve the contrast of the photo. You can apply this technique to almost every photo.

STEP 3

Call up the “Adjust Color Curves” ( Menu : Colors > Curves ). Make the “Value” curve look like a “S” as above. This improves the contrast even further.

STEP 4

Call up the “Adjust Color Balance” ( Menu : Colors > Color Balance ). Select the “Midtones” & move the green slider to the left until it reach -30 or even further. This will bring up the Magenta color.

DONE !

That’s it. The photo should have better contrast & color now.