Lab Color Mode (LAB) is an alternative colorspace that enables you to manipulate the luminosity and colour of your images more flexibly and powerfully than when working within RGB. In this, my first LAB tutorial, I hope to achieve three things. First, I will provide a brief explanation of the theory and numbers behind LAB (and how to work with these within Photoshop). Second, I will demonstrate the advantages of LAB over RGB – i.e. its ability to dramatically alter colour – both in terms of tone and saturation – more flexibly and with less degradation to your images than when using RGB. Third, using a range of real world examples, I will show you how to use LAB to:
This tutorial contains 6566 words, 68 illustrative images and screen grabs, and has received 22 comments.
Each of our tutorials is based around a series of Photoshop files, at the resolution originally posted on chromasia, and each contains all the original adjustment layers I used to create the final image. The ones that are included in this tutorial, and a brief description of how each one will be used, are listed below – the ‘before’ version on the left, the ‘after’ version on the right. Each of these files can be downloaded after you subscribe.
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Image 1 In this example I will show you how to use LAB to dramatically increase i) the contrast of an image (using the Lightness channel), and ii) its saturation (by manipulating the ‘a’ and ‘b’ channels). |
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Image 2 In this example I show you how to alter the ‘a’ and ‘b’ channels within LAB to add a unique tone to your images. |
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Image 3 In this example I will show you how to use the ‘a’ and ‘b’ Curves to i) partially desaturate an image, and ii) alter its colour balance. |
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Image 4 In this example I will show you how to manipulate the ‘a’ and ‘b’ Curves to invert a specific colour range within an image. |
There are three ways to subscribe to the tutorials on chromasia, either by subscribing to an individual tutorial or by taking out an annual subscription or lifetime membership. Details regarding all three options are included below:
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| LIFETIME MEMBERSHIP | ||
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To find out more about our other individual tutorials please click any of the following images. Alternatively, you can visit our main tutorials page for further information on: our annual subscriptions and lifetime memberships; next month’s issue; and our current members’s offer. You can also read through our sample tutorial on Tonal Range and the Curves tool.
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David J. Nightingale © 2003-08 • all rights reserved