Colorizing Hair


This technique (that I learned from Kevin Ames) gives you maximum control and flexibility while changing or adjusting hair color. Best of all, because you use layer masks and an adjustment layer, you're not "bruising the pixels"; instead, you're following the enlightened path of "nondestructive retouching."

Step One

Open the photo you want to retouch. Choose Color Balance from the Create New Adjustment Layer pop-up menu (it's the half-black/half-white circle icon) at the bottom of the Layers palette.

Step Two

When the dialog appears, adjust the sliders until you have a color that you want as the hair color. You can adjust the Shadows, Midtones, and Highlights by selecting each in the Tone Balance section of the Color Balance dialog and then moving the color sliders. In this case, we want to make her hair red, so we'll move the top slider toward Red for the Shadows (to +16), then the Midtones (to +74), and then the Highlights (to +45). Now, click OK, and the entire photo will have a heavy red cast over it.

Step Three

Press the letter X until your Foreground color is black, and press Option-Delete (PC: Alt-Backspace) to fill the Color Balance layer mask with black. Doing so removes the red tint from the photo.

Step Four

Press B to get the Brush tool from the Toolbox, click on the thumbnail to the right of the word "Brush" in the Options Bar, and then choose a soft-edged brush in the Brush Picker. Press D to set your Foreground color to white, and then begin painting over her hair. As you paint, the red tint you added with Color Balance is added back in. Once the hair is fully tinted, go to the Layers palette and change the layer blend mode of your Color Balance adjustment layer from Normal to Color, and then lower the Opacity until the hair color looks natural (around 50%).

Before

After



    The Photoshop CS2 Book(c) for Digital Photographers
    The Photoshop CS2 Book for Digital Photographers (Voices That Matter)
    ISBN: B002DMJUBS
    EAN: N/A
    Year: 2006
    Pages: 187
    Authors: Scott Kelby

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