How to get pictures to look like this?

[prophet]

I am trying to get pictures to look something likes this: https://stuckincustoms.smugmug.com/... spurts out a little hole on top-912x1000.jpg

I am not quite sure how to achieve this sort of retro look. Any rough advice on how to process a picture to get this look?

 

[David A]

White balance, playing with saturation overall plus also the saturation/luminance values for selected colours (greens, yellows in this case), perhaps a bit of blurring of the background and applying sharpening/clarity to the main subject. Some of these adjustments will be made to the whole image, some to specific parts of the image.

How you go about doing those sort of things is going to depend on the software you use because different applications work in different ways. You may be able to locate presets, either free ones or purchasing commercial presets, which go a long way towards delivering this sort of result but not all applications support presets.

 

[wjiang]

A large aspect will be reduction of contrast (especially lifting of blacks), and split toning.

 

[TassieFig]

A good place to look for a preset is StuckinCustom if you like Trey Ratcliff style. Maybe you could ask him directly about this particular photo

 

[Tenpenny]

I believe you can also achieve this look in photoshop by adding a color balance adjustment layer. looks like cyan was punched up in the shadows and yellow in the highlights.

 

[DoofClenas]

Perhaps post a picture that you'd like to see get edited by users here.

 

[marcsitkin]

Nik Filters Analog effects offers a starting point for looks like that. Or, take a time machine back to the 70's

 

[AG_Alex2097]

Push cyan highlights (a little), midtones and shadows (a lot) in the shadow areas of the picture, push magenta shadows and midtones (a little) on lit areas, increase the overall yellows (a little) and the overall greens (a tiny bit), finally pull up the blacks & decrease contrast
Should get you 80% of the way there, the rest is refining, what makes this picture stand out is the reflections due to the wet surfaces though (great picture, nice eye from the photographer), you're not going to get this with normal shadows (since it's the highlights in the shadow that make the effect here)

Here's an attempt at de-processing, using the parameters mentioned above
Gyazo - 369074a28ec245b2258a83d2a307ac31.png
(maybe still a little bit too much magenta in there and perhaps pushed contrast a bit too much)
If it's not ok to have edited the picture, please let me know and i'll remove the link, just using it for demonstration purposes here
But you don't need to go around searching for the right plugin filters to purchase when you have full control over it this way

 

[Nathanael]

VSCO Film

 

[InlawBiker]

For a while VSCO had a free trial pack with Kodak Gold and Tri-X. It really does look just like Kodak Gold! I love VSCO, the filters really work as advertised. I don't see the free version on their site anymore though.

 

[spatulaboy]

This is split toning. You can give your highlights and shadow areas specific color tones. Notice the shadows are green.

 

[svenkarma]

I believe you can also achieve this look in photoshop by adding a color balance adjustment layer. looks like cyan was punched up in the shadows and yellow in the highlights.

As a moderately color-blind person to whom the concept of a "color balance adjustment layer" is kinda problematic, might I ask how this effect can be approximated by e.g. the tone curves in Lightroom?

 

[PacNWMike]

I am not quite sure how to achieve this sort of retro look.

That's the kind of "retro" look that makes me think I'd better start scanning negatives before they all look like that

 

[David A]

As a moderately color-blind person to whom the concept of a "color balance adjustment layer" is kinda problematic, might I ask how this effect can be approximated by e.g. the tone curves in Lightroom?

I'd probably start by using the Split Toning panel which lets you apply different tints to the highlights and the shadows. You can choose your own tints from a colour picker.

Alternatively you can go to the point curves in the Curves panel and make different adjustments to the individual red, green, and blue curves available there but you may find it harder dealing in the specific tints you want. The Split Toning panel is a much simpler and easier option to start working with.

If you are moderately colour blind you may find the curves option much harder to work with than the Split Toning panel.

 

[John M Flores]

This is split toning. You can give your highlights and shadow areas specific color tones. Notice the shadows are green.

Not all of them. Check the lower left. There is split toning but also a mask as you can see some halos in the greenish shadow edges.

 

[GBarrington]

LOTS of filter programs offer this sort of effect, just look for those filters that are named some variant of "retro" or "old film". Not to demean your interests in this, but if you are like many photographers, you will get tired of this sort of thing pretty quickly.

 

[aidanw]

Suggestion is to use an effects app (I use ON1 Effects 10 because it was free, integrates with LR and it's pretty good, albeit slow!) on a virtual copy of your photo. Then try mimic what the effect did in LR yourself. You'll hopefully be able to see what has been changed.

 

[dmcgrew]

VSCO Film Lightroom filters have a ton of similar retro looks. That's the way to go IMO.

 

[silver92b]

I am trying to get pictures to look something likes this: https://stuckincustoms.smugmug.com/Portfolio/i-x4HHDCc/0/912x1000/Bonus Photo - Day 25 - There are thousands of fountains all over Rome where the water is perfectly drinkable — one secret thing many have is if you plug the bottom, the water spurts out a little hole on top-912x1000.jpg

I am not quite sure how to achieve this sort of retro look. Any rough advice on how to process a picture to get this look?

ON 1 software suite has a number of presets and filters that can give you similar effects. One click can get you any number of effects you might like, and then you can modify them as you desire and save them as your own custom preset. I'm not a shill for this software, but I got it and it proved very useful. I also use the NIK software suite which is great, but I'm not sure it's still available. I'd try these types of software solutions to get started and then manipulate your images further to suit your creative ideas.

 

[agentlossing]

Perfect Effects is very good. Easy to overdo these sorts of effects though, I'd call the example you posted just about on the guilty side of that.