Very lovely, thank you for your awesome guide! I wanna see way more of those kinds, very helpful and straight to the point.
I already developed this exact style by accident and I’m using it most of the time for my pics.
I have a 1/4 or 1/2 black mist filter strapped on and do following post-processing steps:
decrease contrast
increase brilliance
add some grain
stronger filmic RGB with blacks lifted, and too strong lights
and then increase or decrease the strongest color in the color spectrum thingy (I don’t know the english name for it, sorry).
If it should look a bit dreamy or special, then I increase the blue of the sky/ the orange of a sunset/ the tone of the subject for example. See photo 1 and 2.
Normally, I don’t amplify specific colours by default, because I have a CVD and then the pic looks very artificial. It’s more of a special style element that’s used when needed, but not otherwise.
If I want to let the viewer to look at the “contrast”, which I already decreased by a lot, to let patterns or objects pop out more, or give the pic a “depressing” mood, then I decrease the brilliance of one tone. See photo 2
Picture 1: It still looks “wintery and sad”, but the green of the twig is amplified. If the greens wouldn’t be re-compensated, the whole pic would almost be black and white. 1000013077
Pic 2: here I increased the purples a bit and amplified the shadows to fetch the mood and focus of the sunrise DSC06116
Picture 3: still not much contrast, but the almost black&white-look and increased shadows put the focus onto the ice crystals instead of the interior of the barn.
In that way, I can artificially set more contrast, even if I reduced it before. DSC05536
Yeah, I’m tired of watching 30 minute YouTube videos that I could’ve read in a few minutes. I grew up reading text tutorials for things like Photoshop and really wish they’d make a comeback
If you like this effect, consider buying a Black Mist diffusion filter. On a lower strength, they really take the digital edge off, and on higher ones, they give everything a moody vibe.
The ones from K&F cost only 20 bucks and are a must have for me!
Glad you liked it! Yes darktable is amazing, though it can be intimidating at first. There’s so many interesting things you can do with the modules and masking. I always wished for more text tutorials when I was starting out with it so trying to fill that gap now that I’ve used it for a few years.
nishchalb.github.io
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