The Artfkt collection library
Color
Shape the tones before choosing the palette
Color shapes the image’s tonal foundation and palette. Correct an exposure or color cast, separate shadows from highlights, or deliberately replace photographic color with a graphic duotone or gradient.
Use the collection early in a stack to prepare an image, or later to unify the result. In either position, judge what the adjustment does to the composition’s focal point.
Included in Artfkt for Mac. All collections, one desktop studio.
Build the tonal structure before the palette
Exposure changes overall brightness in stops. Levels sets tonal endpoints and midtone response, while Curves offers more local shaping through tonal knots. Contrast expands or compresses values around a pivot. These controls overlap in purpose, so choose the smallest set that makes the subject readable.
Compare a shadow, a midtone, and a highlight as you work. Making the picture more forceful is not always the same as making it more useful: a hard contrast treatment can remove the subtle separation a later material or print effect needs. Keep tonal variation where it describes the subject.
Choose between recoloring and color correction
White Balance addresses warm-cool and green-magenta casts. Color Balance adjusts tonal regions, and Selective Color targets a color family. These are useful when you want the original palette to remain recognizable while changing its emphasis.
Duotone maps shadows and highlights toward two selected colors; Gradient Map uses an editable sequence of colors across luminance. They make stronger graphic decisions because color follows brightness rather than the original material. A red object and a blue object of similar brightness may become much closer in the mapped result.
Make a restricted palette do useful work
A limited palette can bring unrelated image elements into a shared visual language. Choose sufficient separation between its dark and light colors so silhouettes remain legible, then use a middle color only when it adds a meaningful transition.
Black & White lets source color contributions shape monochrome separation; Split Tone can reintroduce different tints into dark and light regions. Hue/Saturation and Vibrance serve other needs, such as rotating a palette or lifting restrained color. Compare each change against the role the image plays in the complete design.
Effects in Color
16 effects to explore and combine.
Exposure
Lift or lower the image exposure in stops.
Contrast
Expand or compress the tonal range around an adjustable pivot.
White Balance
Warm or cool the image and correct a green or magenta cast.
Hue & Saturation
Rotate the image colors and adjust their intensity.
Black & White
Convert the image to monochrome with control over source colors.
Duotone
Map shadows and highlights to two chosen colors.
Invert
Invert the displayed red, green, and blue values for a photographic negative.
Gradient Map
Map luminance smoothly through an editable multi-stop gradient.
Split Tone
Tint shadows and highlights independently while retaining tonal detail.
Color Balance
Balance opposing color channels independently in shadows, midtones, and highlights.
Levels
Set black and white endpoints and reshape the midtones.
Shadows & Highlights
Lift or deepen shadows and highlights independently.
Selective Color
Adjust one color family while retaining the surrounding palette.
Vibrance
Lift muted colors while protecting already saturated regions.
Channel Mixer
Recombine the red, green, and blue contributions of each output channel.
Curves
Redraw brightness through five tonal knots, then bend red, green, and blue away from that shared curve.
Creative applications
- Unify a poster image and graphic background through a small, deliberate palette.
- Prepare a photograph’s tonal range before applying halftone, fabric, or other surface treatments.
- Develop alternative monochrome and duotone directions from the same source image.
Starting workflow
- For a duotone cover study, choose a photograph with a clear silhouette and useful separation between dark and light areas.
- Use Levels to establish the endpoints without merging important neighboring tones.
- Apply Duotone and choose a darker shadow color and a lighter highlight color that fit the cover’s palette.
- Adjust tonal balance while watching the subject’s contour and midtone detail rather than matching a preset appearance.
- Compare the result beside the intended title and at its final size. Change the palette or balance if the image competes with the text.
Make it part of your next composition.
Combine Color with other collections, images, and editable text in Artfkt for Mac.