Remove color cast from an image - A step-by-step guide

Do you have a photo with an unpleasant color cast and want to get back the original colors? In this tutorial, I'll show you a simple and quick method to remove color casts in Adobe Photoshop. Whether you're just starting out with Photoshop or you're already an experienced user, this technique will help you enhance and bring your images back to life.

Main Takeaways

• Color casts can be easily removed using the Camera RAW filter.
• Post-processing saturation can help eliminate any remaining color casts.
• Using layer masks, you can adjust specific parts of the image without affecting other areas.

Step-by-Step Guide

First, open your image in Photoshop. Once you've uploaded the image, you may notice an unpleasant orange color cast.

To remove this color cast, first go to the image layer in the Layers panel. Click on "Filter" in the menu at the top, and then select "Camera RAW Filter."

In the Camera RAW Filter, you will find the "White Balance" option on the right side. Select the pipette there to edit the color cast specifically.

Now, you can drag the pipette with the mouse button pressed over the entire image area. Release the mouse button when you are satisfied with the area you want to adjust. You will immediately see the colors balance out.

Click on "OK" to confirm your changes. You have already achieved a lot with this! This method works great for many images.

If, however, not all color casts have disappeared, I'll now show you how you can adjust the saturation selectively.

To work with saturation, go to the circle symbol at the bottom right and select the Hue/Saturation adjustment. Then, in the new window, go to the cyan tones to further adjust the color cast.

Now you can easily reduce the saturation of these hues. As you decrease the saturation, you will notice the cyan tones gradually disappear, and the colors become more natural again.

If you select a different color in this area, you can try out various hues with the hue slider.

For example, how about making the image slightly more yellowish? You can further decrease the saturation to make the new colors look realistic.

If there are areas you do not want to affect with this adjustment, you can easily control this through a layer mask. Select the layer mask and use a brush with a black foreground color to mark the areas that should not be adjusted.

Painting over these areas will bring back the original cyan tones you want in your image.

On the other hand, if you paint with white color over these areas, you can remove the cyan tones. This technique gives you a lot of control over color adjustments in your image.

The principle is: Everything that is white on the layer mask remains visible and unaffected. Everything that is black, on the other hand, is hidden and remains untouched by the change.

Summary

In this tutorial, you have learned how to remove color casts from an image in Photoshop. Using the Camera RAW filter and the capabilities provided by the hue/saturation adjustment, you can significantly enhance your images. Targeted editing with layer masks gives you the freedom to make individual adjustments without ruining the entire image.