Capture One’s Color Editor enables you to select all the colors and adjust them equally or to select and adjust a specific color or narrow a range of colors without affecting other unrelated colors in the image. Thus, it can be used to enhance or subdue colors selectively, alter from one color to another, or correct color casts such as those produced under artificial light. Specific features include the selection of highly targeted colors such as skin tones with the ability to enhance and blend them for lustrous-looking results, as well as options to make masks from a color selection and to save precisely made adjustments as ICC color profiles.
Located under the Color tool tab, the Color Editor is available in three modes: Basic, Advanced, and Skin Tone, with each mode accessed from the tabs in the tool. All three modes adopt an easy-to-use Color Picker tool allowing you to target the color you want to correct. In addition, a 2-D color wheel provides the confirmation of the chosen color and a narrow range of related colors.
The color wheel places fully-saturated primary and secondary colors around a ring, ranging from red through yellow, green, blue, and finally returning to the red color again. A third axis, not shown on a 2-D wheel, represents lightness.
All three selection modes of the Color Editor enable shifting of the chosen color around the three axes, using Hue, Saturation, and Lightness sliders.
The Hue slider adjusts the selected color or color range towards another. For example, if you select blue, moving the slider to the left shifts the hue clockwise around the wheel towards green, while a move to the right will shift the hue in the other direction, towards red.
- The Saturation slider adjusts the intensity or purity of the selected color or color range. Moving the slider to the left desaturates the chosen colors, moving them towards the center of the wheel. Adjusting the slider to the right increases saturation.
- The Lightness slider alters the brightness of the selected color range.
- The fourth parameter, Smoothness, adjusts the degree of change between the selected color range and related colors, ensuring that colors get a natural look with smooth transitions between them.
Indicated by a wireframe, the selection or slice can be adjusted to make the color range more or less targeted, depending on the desired effect. Handles are incorporated for adjustment and the panel can be dragged away from the tool tab and expanded for even greater precision and control.
For mundane color adjustments, the Basic part of the Color Editor comes in handy as it allows one set of adjustments per color range (red, green, blue, cyan, magenta, yellow, orange, and pink).
The Advanced mode provides a much more specialized tool, permitting up to 30 individual colors to be corrected per image. It also offers more control over the Lightness.
Through the addition of three Uniformity sliders, the Skin Tone mode offers more tools to even out or homogenize color. It is useful for correcting unwanted color variation, particularly when images have had strong global contrast and high saturation adjustments applied, or when simply correcting patchy skin tones or uneven application of the make-up.
Saving a color scheme as an ICC profile
Saving a color scheme as a preset
Creating a mask from a color selection
<< Changing the color wheel layout | About local adjustments >>
Comments
2 comments
Hi! Is there a short cut for the color picker? I've hovered over the icon and looked online, but can't seem to find it. Thanks!
You can assign one to it in the "edit keyboard shortcuts" section 👍🏼
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