Changing the temperature of a photo in Photoshop

Written: October 25th, 2003 at 07:28 PM by Ken Chevy

This is for those of you that (like me) are just learning how to use Photoshop (and other versions I would suppose). I have found that for me, if someone were to show me, I seem to be able to grasp how to do something easier than reading or being told how to do it. And for those of you who are gurus at Photoshop, if you see someway I can make the following easier/quicker, PLEASE pass that info on to all of us! Thank you.

I have only been using Photoshop a few months and don't know how to use it very well yet. I am learning a lot from reading what others say how they do it.

Many already know how easy it is to mask/and or/use layers to put different exposures together to make a more 'pleasing' picture. Many ALSO don't know the first step on how to do it. This small article is how I do it (sometimes... sometimes not, I am ALWAYS experimenting, trying to learn, you have a better way, tell me.)

We shoot Canon, Ani uses a D60 and I use a 10D. We shoot in RAW mode. Took me a while to figure THAT out, took me a while to figure out we MUST shoot brackets too. So usually we will shoot 2 stops under, 1 stop under and 1 normal (to the camera) exposure.

For this article I didn't use my bracketed exposures, I use the same CRW file for all three exposures to show how the temperature of a CRW file can be changed when pulling it into Photoshop.


2. For this 'MrChevy Show & Tell' I chose a Canon CRW (RAW) shot that was at a Temperature of 4000. Notice the size and resolution I use, also AdobeRGB 1998.

These screen shots are of the way I use Adobe Camera Raw (i.e. The Adobe ACR plug-in) to change the Temperature of the picture while pulling it into Photoshop. The ACR plug-in in a seamless interface to Photoshop, just click on a .CRW file and ACR opens. For me, the ACR download was well worth the money. They have included it in Photoshop CS (Photoshop8).