Learn how to boost colour in your images

Saturation or Vibrance? Which should you use when in Photoshop and Lightroom? And when do you need both?

Saturation

Saturation increases the intensity of every colour evenly. Colours that are already saturated will become oversaturated, while more muted tones get richer. It’s great for nature scenes, but skin tones become very orange and unsightly. Drag the slider to the left to mute tones, and to the right to boost them. Generally, you want to avoid too much Saturation. Think of it like salt: a small amount makes food taste much better, but a lot makes it inedible.

Vibrance

Vibrance works differently: it only adds saturation to colours that are less saturated. It’s also specifically designed to protect skin tones from over-saturation. Pushing it to extremes will still over-saturate them, but not to the extent that the basic Saturation slider will.

With landscapes, adding a lot of Vibrance results in a stronger boost in the blues. Because of this these landscapes, can often benefit from using both Vibrance and Saturation. Shots with people in them are the perfect target for the Vibrance slider on its own, allowing you to enrich colour in the scene without destroying the look of the skin.

Colour really is the most fundamental element of modern photography. We use it in all kinds of way to relay information in our photos, from colour harmony to pure impact. Colour itself can be described with just three terms: hue, which describes the overall character of a colour (the degree of red, blue, green or yellow); lightness, which is how bright or dark the colour is; and saturation, which is the intensity, or richness of the colour.

It’s this intensity of colour that you can control to draw the viewer’s eye and create impact in your photos. When you start using Saturation in your software, it can be like giving sugar to a kid: you just love it, and want more and more! At the beginning, it’s far too easy to add too much. A good rule of thumb is to add some, and then just try a little bit less. After a while, you’ll see the garishness that overuse of Saturation causes and use it more effectively. You can also remove Saturation to mute the colour in the photo.

As well as Saturation, you can control colour by adjusting Vibrance. The two options have some things in common, but there are important differences…

Sean McCormack is a photographer and writer. He’s the author of The Indispensable Guide to Lightroom CC. Sean McCormack seanmccormack.com Saturation +20: Saturation +50: This modest adjustment gives the colours a pleasing richness. The skin starts to look unsightly. Using Vibrance would avoid this. Vibrance +20: Vibrance +50: The weakest colours in the scene get a boost, with a nnice overall effect. Colours are starting to get quite strong, but it still feels coherent.

Saturation +100: Saturation -20: Saturation -100: Now the entire photo is looking garish, with overdone hues. Taking Saturation slightly into minus figures mutes the colour range. Not necessarily the best mono conversion, but certainly a simple one. Vibrance +100: Saturation + 25, Vibrance +25: Vibrance -100: At full strength the blues dominate at the expense of warm tones. Mix Vibrance and Saturation for better colour in landscapes. Unlike when you take Saturation right down, there’s still a hint of colour left here.