How to get these vintage-y colors?

jaker654 · May 13, 2013

Hi All,

I'm interested in figuring out how to get colors likes these in my photos: https://www.airbnb.com/locations/new-york/union-square Any clue as to what the photographer did in lightroom/photoshop to achieve this aesthetic?

Many thanks!

The_Traveler · May 13, 2013

that link is to a large website; could you localize to a single photo or set of photos?

DarkShadow · May 13, 2013

Looking at some of the pictures I see nothing special.some are OOF others are over exposed.I see way better pictures from TPF members.

o hey tyler · May 13, 2013

jaker654 said:
Hi All,

I'm interested in figuring out how to get colors likes these in my photos: https://www.airbnb.com/locations/new-york/union-square Any clue as to what the photographer did in lightroom/photoshop to achieve this aesthetic?

Many thanks!

I have a pretty good idea what they did.

KmH · May 13, 2013

How to get the old vintage photograph look - Bing

Ysarex · May 13, 2013

You bet.

Start by shooting camera JPEGs. Take a badly lit scene and expose it to nuke the highlights into oblivion as in this example photo:

Open the JPEG in LR and:

1. Raise the temp and tint values to warm up the white balance. I raised the temp to 14 and the tint to 12.
2. Take the contrast way down. I went to -30.
3. Highlights and Whites all the way to -100. This puts a nice solid flat grey into all the blown highlights.
4. You may need to drop the blacks/shadows a little to get a reasonable black point. The goal is to make it look like you at least had a decent exposure at one point. I set the black to -25.
5. This is key -- lower the vibrance setting to even out and lower the saturation. I set it to -35.
6. Move the photo to Photoshop and one click on Auto Tone and Auto Color and you're finished.

One bad photo turned into stylized art:

Joe

Derrel · May 13, 2013

Download some of Matt K's free Lightroom Presets. Lightroom Killer Tips | Lightroom Presets, Videos, Tips and News

One-click conversions.

jaker654 · May 14, 2013

Derrel said:
Download some of Matt K's free Lightroom Presets. Lightroom Killer Tips | Lightroom Presets, Videos, Tips and News

One-click conversions.

these are great!

thanks also to Ysarex!