Amazing Vintage Effect

Marcus Geezer · 2 Aug 2012

Please have a look at the amazing work of this gentleman from France.

http://laurentnivalle.fr/_LMC2012.html

He's obviously a fantastic photographer and he has applied quite a unique sequence of actions to them to give them this look. I've been studying and studying these and it seems like he has given the colours a pastel feel, whilst applying a selective desaturation whilst keeping the prime colours bright, and at the same time given the image a grungy sepia feel.

I've been playing in photoshop and easy enough to give my own work a suitable grungy feel, I can add a sepia tone, but to get the colours to work like his, I'm lost, I can't work it out how he has done it. They seem to have a vintage feel to them, but it isn't typical of how I understand cross-processed typical vintage photo's can look. Also when I apply the sepia or desaturation adjustment layers it kills the prime colours.

Because of the quantity of images and the way the colours work I'm convinced it isn't the old layer mask selective colour trick and I'm thinking it is a mix of some kind of blending mode, maybe within a group, with some kind of contrasting or inversion going on to mute all but the prime colours. I feel like I'm on the edge of understanding this, but can't get it and it's bugging the hell out of me.

Can anyone with suitable photoshop skills help at all? I think I just need to understand a way of desaturating all but the prime colours as a starting point.

On the Huh · 2 Aug 2012

parker j pfister action set maybe?

http://www.parkerjphoto.com/pjddrv2/

symmetricalOCD · 2 Aug 2012

It looks like he's used split toning, decreased contrast and vibrancy and then applied the same effect to all the photos, some of them with clarity increased... I'm guessing that he used lightroom instead of photoshop?

it reminds me of the 'aged photo' preset in LR4 but a bit more subtle.

Marcus Geezer · 2 Aug 2012

On the Huh said:
parker j pfister action set maybe?

http://www.parkerjphoto.com/pjddrv2/

Hmmm... I can see elements of it here but not the look I'm after I don't think.

symmetricalOCD said:
It looks like he's used split toning, decreased contrast and vibrancy and then applied the same effect to all the photos, some of them with clarity increased... I'm guessing that he used lightroom instead of photoshop?

it reminds me of the 'aged photo' preset in LR4 but a bit more subtle.

I use photoshop CS5 but I believe the raw editor has the same sliders so what you can do in lightroom you can do in photoshop? Yes he has used some form of split toning or cross processing technique, and clarity or an equivalent action in photoshop, and I've played with vibrancy up, down, combined with saturation up and down and cannot re-create it.

After 6 hours of trawling the internet, researching different actions and techniques, playing with saturation, hue, vibrancy, selective colour adjustment layers, blending modes, inverse blending modes within layer groups, I cannot get the look!

Although an action would be great, I want to understand how it is done.

Anyone?

Kerioak · 2 Aug 2012

Those were two of the most difficult sites to navigate/load I have come across in a long time.

The first one - the racing cars - seem to have a HDR feel to them as well - highly selectively sharpened anyway?

Marcus Geezer · 2 Aug 2012

Kerioak said:
Those were two of the most difficult sites to navigate/load I have come across in a long time.

The first one - the racing cars - seem to have a HDR feel to them as well - highly selectively sharpened anyway?

Hi Christine,

I was wondering about this, and I'm not sure it is strictly a HDR process but maybe a tone mapping exercise. I think one day I'm going to have to get photomatix one day to see what all the fuss us about.

It's the colours I'm more interested in. It's a very specialised process, and want to understand it.

Cheers,

graphilly · 2 Aug 2012

It's almost cinematic. Take a look at some of those styles and actions.

swanseamale47 · 2 Aug 2012

Kerioak said:
Those were two of the most difficult sites to navigate/load I have come across in a long time.

The first one - the racing cars - seem to have a HDR feel to them as well - highly selectively sharpened anyway?

I have to agree Christine.

Marcus Geezer · 2 Aug 2012

swanseamale47 said:
I have to agree Christine.

I really dont think it is just hdr and sharpening. There is so much more going on than that. Colours? Contrast? Grungy detail enhancement?

Marcus Geezer · 2 Aug 2012

graphilly said:
It's almost cinematic. Take a look at some of those styles and actions.

Will research this now. Thanks!

Alastair · 2 Aug 2012

Some of the images have some tone-mapping going on, but the general colour feel reminds me of some LR3 presets, with a lot of selective colour treatments in the preset. And probably not the same preset for every image - either a base plus adjustment or a family of related presets.

symmetricalOCD · 2 Aug 2012

graphilly said:
It's almost cinematic. Take a look at some of those styles and actions.

I thought that too, it looks like he has used a cine lens perhaps?

TheDrift- · 3 Aug 2012

He used a 5d mk 2 with a 85 1.2L

If you really want to know how he did it, he left the "full monty" in his exif...sorry had to split over 2 posts

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