Color balance can be used to correct color imperfections in your image. You can also use color balance to create dramatic effects by changing the overall mixture of colors used in your composite. Photo Filter is another option that lets you apply a hue adjustment to your image. Photo Filter adjustments mimic the technique of placing a colored filter in front of your camera lens to adjust the color balance and temperature of the light transmitted through the lens and exposing the film.
Applying both Color Balance and Photo Filter as adjustment layers is a more flexible method to work with them because it gives you the ability to readjust the settings, creates a layer mask to affect a part of an image, and protects the original image from direct changes.
In Photoshop, you can access the color balance adjustment option from any of the following locations:
- In the Adjustments panel, click the Color Balance (
) icon.
- Choose Layer > New Adjustment Layer > Color Balance. Click OK in the New Layer dialog box.
- In the Layers panel, click Create new fill or adjustment layer (
) icon. Select Color Balance from the context menu options.
- You can also choose Image > Adjustments > Color Balance. However, this method applies destructive adjustments to the image layer and discards image information due to which you cannot restore the original image.
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In the Properties panel that opens, select any of the Tone balance options— Shadows, Midtones, or Highlights to select the tonal range in which you want to focus your edits.
Color balance Properties panel: Go to Adjustments panel, and click the Color Balance icon.Color Balance dialog: Select Layer > New Adjustment Layer > Color Balance -
Move the Cyan/Red, Magenta/Green, or Yellow/Blue slider toward a color that you want to add to the image; drag the slider away from a color that you want to subtract from the image. The values displayed above the sliders, show the color changes for red, green, and blue channels. These values can range from ‑100 to +100. You can directly view the adjustments being applied to your image while moving the sliders.

You can access the Photo Filter option from any of the following locations:
- In the Adjustments panel, click the Photo Filter icon (
) icon.
- Choose Layer > New Adjustment Layer > Photo Filter. Click OK in the New Layer dialog box.
- You can also choose Image > Adjustments > Photo Filter. However, this method applies destructive adjustments to the image layer and discards image information due to which you cannot restore the original image.
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In the Properties panel that opens, you can either choose a preset filter or apply a custom color filter:
- Filter: For a preset filter, select the Filter option and choose one of the presets from the drop-down list.
- Color: For a custom filter, select the Color option. Click the color square, and use the Adobe Color Picker to specify a color for a custom color filter.
