Turns out, there are secret tone sliders hiding in the Color Grading panel in Adobe Camera Raw. I’ve been using ACR for a long time, to include the Color Grading section, but I never really pieced two and two together.
These sliders aren’t about color like you’d think. They actually help fix lighting problems, like blown-out highlights or really dark shadows. I tried them on a few tricky waterfall photos and much better results than fumbling with masks or the lighting sliders.
The cool part? These adjustments happen on top of everything else, almost like layers. So, it’s like having a safety net or governor that won’t let you take the edit too far.
Also, here’s a quick tip: switching to the Camera Neutral profile makes a big difference. Softer highlights, less crazy color.
If you’re dealing with harsh light in your photos, this is worth checking out. It’s a simple trick, totally changes the game. And if you want to see how it’s used in a full image workflow, we use this technique in our course Make Great Shots that’s available until April 24th.
For Blake, it's all about the art and process synergy. He dives deep into complex topics and makes them easy to understand through his outside-the-box thinking so that you can use these tricks in your workflow today!
Hi Blake. I don’t have a camera NT profile in my ACR. All my apps are updated. Is it hidden somewhere? Thanks for your great tutorials.
Every camera manufacturer has their own names for their neutral profiles. Look through your Camera Matching profiles and find the one that is the most neutral. Nikon has two, one is FLAT and the other is NEUTRAL. I’m not privy to Canon’s. But these aree all the profiles you can use in camera, they show up in the camera matching section.
Excellent. I knew those sliders were there and had used them now and then for colour work but hadn’t joined the dot re: using them in mono!
Thanks!
I did not know about this use of the “sliders” in the Color Grading panel – thank you. One thing I’ve done in the past and which I would have used on your interior shot (with the steelwork): in Ps, select Color Range for the highlights and bring them down – ever so slighlty, you don’t need much – with a curve on the Color Range layer. Very good for overcast light through leaves and branches in a forest. And you can paint out its effect where not needed.