Apr 14 2009
Split Toning in Lightroom – Video Tutorial
Yes, I know. You’ve been asking for more Lightroom tutorials and I’ve been giving you lots of Photoshop tutorials. 
I hope I’ve redeemed myself today with the cool technique in Lightroom called split toning.
Simply put, split toning is taking a black and white image and adding a color tint to the highlights and a separate color tint to the shadows. You can get some pretty cool effects using this technique. In this Lightroom video tutorial, I’ll be split toning a landscape photo with a cool tint in the highlights and a warm tint in the shadows.
While editting the video, I noticed that I forgot to talk about the Balance slider. You guys are pretty smart and you probably already figured it out. It basically controls the “weight” given to the highlight or shadow tint. At zero, they have equal weight. If you move the slider left, the shadow tint will show more and vice versa when you move it to the right. That’s it! Enjoy!
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Yanik do you tether? If so, does you camera/computer ever lock up after 50-100 or so images? I’m having that trouble, but I’m not using Lightroom, I’m using DPP/EOS Canon software. I have the Canon 5D Mark II. I never had that trouble with my 40D.
Perplexing
Debbi
@ Debbi
Sorry Debbi. I can’t help you there cuz I don’t tether for the moment.. and I’m a Nikon shooter.
Thanks for your nice tutorials I found on Youtube. Just wanted to mention that if you use split toning for colour pictures, it creates even greater effects. Together with white balance, desaturation and this split toning you can create pictures with a very homogen colouring. (:
Great article, useful tips!
Yes, split toning can be very powerful when used on color image. It can induce various moods just by discretely adding color casts. Or to take it even further, it can become strong cross-processing (also works well with strong vignettes!).
Here are some of my own tips, examples and resources on the matter: http://www.alexandruvita.com/blog/2010/11/04/the-power-of-split-toning-for-color-images/
I think it would be helpful to mention the legacy of chemical toners and they colors they can achieve. If you use colors that are close to what is possible in the darkroom the photos will be more ‘believable’. And if people understand where toning really comes from they will better appreciate the effect.
Also – you never commented on the balance slider. Is it possible to separate the highlights from the shadows to leave some ‘untoned’ neutral area in the middle? This was another nice trick from the darkroom days.
Great article. Thank you very much!
I’m a lightroom newbie and searching for video tutorials
I will share you blog on facebook