dSLR & Asian Skin Tone

[sean_buerger]

Hello Camels,

my dissatisfaction with how my dSLRs render Asian Skin Tones is growing. Compared to film there doesn't seem to be any saturation in the reds. So I do not get those rosy skin tones (especially on the cheeks) that I get with film.

I shot hundred over portraits yesterday under natural (cloudy) light and my head is still spinning from adjusting white balance. The auto white balance of Photoshop's RAW converter is really good, if you like Indiana Jones movies, but that's about it. My Panasonic camera does a pretty good job I suppose. It looks pretty neutral at day light, as long as we don't look at the skin rendering.

I've included a screenshot here. The left portion is camera white balance, the centre one is my manual setting (although I would have preferred more red) and on the right hand side you see Photoshop AWB (from RAW).

The walls are actually yellow, so one could say that my color balancing is too cold. But the skin colour on camera AWB and Photoshop AWB is way off.

CORRECTION: Had a look around outside, and must make a correction on the wall colour. The walls are actually white, since the house has been repainted a while ago.

I don't think it's got anything to do with monitor / printer, as I get much(!) "redder" skin tone on film (Fuji negative), when I scan and print with the same equipment.

So it would be interesting to know your satisfaction level with colours on digital! How do you get good skin tones? Any cooking recipes to share?

Cheers, Sean.

[Mr. Pickles]

Well, first of all, I never really use the "Auto" settings in a RAW editor. For my RAW Editor, I use Lightroom, which has the latest ACR engine that PSCS3 can use. For the "best" colors from a RAW editor for an Oly 4/3 system, the Oly software is the best, but the gap in difference is small really.

Also, in Lightroom, I can set and save what they call "Develop Presets". With these, you can tailor the Oly colors to what you feel is correct. Since the develop presets can contain any and all setting,you can figure that if you prefer more reds, you can dial in more reds. Want more green, dial it in. Individual colors can be controlled via saturation, hue or luminosity. Likewise you can control the contrast curve, vibrancy, etc. Once you have the colors like you want (I used a color chart with other pictures of real life things on it), you save the develop preset settings, and then when you want to correct one image or a batch, you select the image(s) and click the preset and whammo, all of the images take the preset characteristics.

I could see that for some people tones would need a bit of this or that, so if Asian portraits aren't working so well, it would be a somewhat simple modification to a preset to adjust, and once you settle on it, you save that one too.

With all that said, I'm not so sure that any camera will actually get you exactly what you want from the camera or from some auto or really simple software setting. I think you would have to modify some of the settings to achieve what you like. With presets, it is pretty easy to hit on wild color schemes that mimic film or other tastes. Lightroom makes it easy, but others can too.

In the images below, I like the skin tones. One is outside with sunshine and the other is indoor with flash...

P6190955.jpg

P6191042.jpg

[sean_buerger]

Hey thanks for your reply!

As regards to the delivered RAW converter with the camera, I get a Panasonic software (cam is Pana L10). The software is a little awkward to use and really too slow on my machine and basically delivers, what the camera would do. I think the software is called "Silky Pix". I presume Olympus have their own converter.

I did compare the Panasonic with the D200 for several portraits and have to say that the camera has a very minor (practically negligible) impact here. I could have posted this with the D200 in the Nikon forum, but I prefer to use the Panasonic for now for other reasons.

I have to take a look at those preset-settings you mentioned to tune the colours to my likings. May I ask, what colour chart you used? I feel I really need to improve on this for more portrait work.

And yes - I find the skin tones on your pix very pleasing indeed!

Cheers, Sean.

[Raist3d]

Panasonic is Japanese company so I am pretty sure they must have dedicated some time to the skin colors. Have you tried shooting in JPEG with your L10? I believe they have a setting that they consider more appropriate for portraits?

This is one of the reasons I am inclined to use JPEG as my "film" and concentrate on others. Companies spend a fortune researching the best Bayer interpolation/colors/etc for jpegs so I think it's worth a try and see how it works.

For Olympus using "portrait mode" on the current cameras (E-3/e-420/e-520) really makes a difference on caucasian skin- not sure about asian.

- Raist

[sean_buerger]

Hi there,

must admit I haven't used the L10 with JPEG (not really used to it, haha). But I found Mr Pickles' reply really helpful. I get much more pleasing results using the camera white balance (as shot) and in Photosop's RAW converter, adjusting RED hue & saturation.

This way I get consistent and pleasing results with daylight shots. I will most likely try that out on the coming weekend. Perhaps I will shoot a few JPEGs as well, to get an idea, what the camera itself can deliver.

Cheers, Sean.