Sepia-tone

KJ
Posted By
Kate Jeppson
Jul 1, 2003
Views
585
Replies
17
Status
Closed
I LOVE sepia-tone. However, I am not quite sure how to create it on Photoshop. I read in ‘help’ that under ‘image/adjustments/channel mixer’ you can "create great sepia tones". . but other than that, it doesn’t explain how. Anyone have ideas how to create it? Possibly what numbers would I put in (for Red, Green & Blue)? Thanks!

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Y
YrbkMgr
Jul 1, 2003
One of the easiest ways (and there are at least 3 ways), is to do this:

Set your colors to default black and white with the D key. Then Image|Adjustments|Hue Saturation. In the dialog that pops up, tick the Colorize box. Nice little sepia tone based on the default foreground color. Thus, you could change your foreground to a blue before colorizing and it will be a shade of that blue.

Peace,
Tony
P
Phosphor
Jul 2, 2003
Kate,

The best way to get any single hue is to place a layer on top of the image and fill that layer with the hue of your choice, be it sepia, blue, or whatever. Then set the layer’s blend mode to "COLOR". Leave the layer’s opacity at 100% or reduce it to suit your taste.

The Color blend mode preserves the hue of the top layer and the luminosity of the substrate, so all of the original tonal variations are retained.

You can decide for yourself what mixture of the primaries you want to use for sepia. Red will be the dominant component with green second. The amount of blue you then add will determine the extent of desaturation. You’re the judge. Experiment by varying the components in the color picker. There was a particular mix I personally liked, but I’ve fotgotten what it was and—really—I shouldn’t deprive you the satisfaction of tinkering with the colors for yourself.

George
HM
Harold Morgan
Jul 2, 2003
That was amazing. I wish there was someplace that the different blending modes were explained so I’d have some idea when & where to use them. I think I’ll Google it right now.

"George Austin" wrote in message
Kate,

The best way to get any single hue is to place a layer on top of the image
and fill that layer with the hue of your choice, be it sepia, blue, or whatever. Then set the layer’s blend mode to "COLOR". Leave the layer’s opacity at 100% or reduce it to suit your taste.
The Color blend mode preserves the hue of the top layer and the luminosity
of the substrate, so all of the original tonal variations are retained.
You can decide for yourself what mixture of the primaries you want to use
for sepia. Red will be the dominant component with green second. The amount of blue you then add will determine the extent of desaturation. You’re the judge. Experiment by varying the components in the color picker. There was a particular mix I personally liked, but I’ve fotgotten what it was and—really—I shouldn’t deprive you the satisfaction of tinkering with the colors for yourself.
George
KJ
Kate Jeppson
Jul 2, 2003
George. . . thank you. That really helped a lot. Being that I am not entirely familiar with Photoshop ‘lingo’, at first I was a little confused. . but after playing with it for a while, I figured it out. Thanks again! Just curious. . . what settings do YOU like best for sepia. . . if you can ever remember!?
KJ
Kate Jeppson
Jul 2, 2003
‘cheesefood’: thank you. that is awesome. i didnt realize that was even there. thanks!
KJ
Kate Jeppson
Jul 2, 2003
YrbkMgr: thank you for your help. that helped a lot! thanks for your time!
Y
YrbkMgr
Jul 2, 2003
Heh, I was beginning to feel left out.

In regards to Cheesefoods remark, when you go to the actions pallet, there’s a triangle in the upper right hand corner of it. If you click that, a flyout menu appears and at the bottom will be various action SETS. Contained within one of those sets is a Sepia Tone that shipped (and is usually installed) with Photoshop.

If you click on each one of the sets, you should find it; if not, use that flyout menu to Load Actions and it should default to the location of Photoshop Actions, and you can hunt it down from there.

It is a technique that uses the adjustment layer approach, and works well.

Peace,
Tony
LH
Lawrence Hudetz
Jul 2, 2003
For toning, I use Hue/Sat set to colorize then H to 30 to 35 and Sat anywhere from 3 to 30.

Remember, if you do this as a layer, you can always reduce the effect by clicking that layer in the Layer dialog, then use the opacity slider to taste.
P
Phosphor
Jul 2, 2003
Kate,

"…what settings do YOU like best for sepia. . . if you can ever remember!? "

Memory is not my long suit, and my wife considers me color-disadvantaged. She has me believing that color sense is gender-based. Thus, I defer to you. But maybe I can get you in the right ballpark.

The color picker shows colors in a handful of different systems. For this you probably would do best going with HSB (hue, saturation, and brightness), although any one system has corresponding values in the others. The nice thing about HSB is that you can fix H while varying S and B, whereas in RGB, hue will change with a change in any of the components.

In HSB try a value in the 30-40 degree range with S about 50% and vary brightness to suit the overall image tonality. Decreasing the hue from that range gives more weight to red, making the color more "orangey". Increasing the hue adds relatively more green, taking you toward brownish-yellow.

By the way, the Action to which you were referred above uses a hue of 30 degrees and a saturation of 25%

George
P
Phosphor
Jul 2, 2003
Kate,

"…the Action to which you were referred above uses a hue of 30 degrees and a saturation of 25%…"

That was a misleading statement. Also, the numbers that come up are the defaults and you alter them as you see fit.

The saturation slider value is the saturation of the adjustment layer— not the resulting saturation so, although it of course influences the result, it is not literally the saturation you see.

The hue slider value, on the other hand, is the actual hue of both the adjustment layer and the resulting image.

George
P
Phosphor
Jul 3, 2003
"…Show a man 20 shades of red and he’ll say that they’re all red…"

Show a man ONE shade of red and you won’t need the others!
Y
YrbkMgr
Jul 3, 2003
Me: "Honey, where’s my Pink shirt?"
Wife: "You don’t have a pink shirt honey, you have a salmon shirt." Me: Okay, okay, where’s my Salmon shirt then?
P
Phosphor
Jul 4, 2003
"You don’t have a pink shirt honey, you have a salmon shirt."

Been meaning to talk to you about that, Tony !! 🙂

You don’t have "a nice little sepia tone" (reply 1), you have RED.

The red (hue = 0) is sufficiently desaturated to pass for sepia, provided the image being modified is not fully bright. Looks good, however!

George
P
Phosphor
Jul 4, 2003
Tony,

…. it wouldn’t matter if it were pink or not…"

Wouldn’t matter to me but, as we’ve been saying, ANY woman would pick up on it, especially in the bright portions of the image.

George
RH
r_harvey
Jul 4, 2003
I’ve no trouble distinguishing and remembering colors (and smells), but do they all have to have unique names? I mean what’s a puce, anyway, some kind of tropical fruit?
L
LenHewitt
Jul 4, 2003
Can we get back on Topic now guys, or take it to the lounge?
P
Phosphor
Jul 4, 2003
OK, Len, back on topic…

Tony, although your suggested method produced a red tone not too far removed from sepia at low-to-medium brightnesses, the method is a good one and can be used to get sepia or any other color.

The color you get is determined by the foreground color. If you want sepia, make sepia (not black, as you instructed)the foreground color. The colorize feature in the Hue/Saturation dialog box extracts only the hue datum from the foreground, ignoring saturation and brightness foreground characteristics. (The colorize maneuver does not ignore saturation and brightness in the image—only in the foreground)

If the foreground is black or white or any shade of gray, it has no hue. In that case, colorize uses a hue of zero, i.e., red—since H=0 defines red. Thus RGB foregrounds of 0/0/0, 255/255/255, 110/110/110, x/x/x, 1/0/0, 35/0/0, etc will all colorize the same.

In fact, if R and G are equal and red has a greater value (R/x/x, R>x) the hue is red and the "colorize" product will look the same no matter what R and x are provided that relationship holds.

To get sepia using the Hue/Saturation Colorize feature, then, set the foreground hue to sepia which, I would say is in the vicinity of 30 degrees, the variation from which is a subjective matter left to the eye of the beholder. You don’t have to be concerned with the foreground saturation or brightness settings (only hue) for the colorize operation. The saturation can even be zero!

George

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