Color Theory Pro Will Help You Manage Color Like a Pro

Managing colors is one of the most important things photographers need to get right. It’s true for portrait, landscape, and wedding photographers—all of us. And there are a lot of approaches to getting the color right.

So here's something new from Mike Ruge, a fine art photographer in Europe. He was so interested in having an easy-to-use tool for color control that he created one. It's a Photoshop plug-in called Color Theory Pro.

Mike’s aim is to allow photographers to have precise control of colors and easily manage them to their taste.

The tool has two sections: manual and automatic mode.

The manual mode allows you to generate any color with a high degree of accuracy. Built into the tool are algorithms based on color theory principles. You can create a whole palette of colors, then apply them to your photos with a click.

The automatic mode includes a button labeled "AIC." That means Automatic Image Cloning. You load an existing image with a color palette you like, and with a click, those colors are transferred to your new image.

Using Color Theory Pro

I was most interested in the clone tool, so I gave it a try. I opened a recent drone photo I took at Becker’s Butte in Arizona.

This is a straight-out-of-the-camera image taken about 90 minutes before sundown. I then opened the Color Theory Pro plug-in from within Photoshop.

Clicking on the AIC button let me choose a photo to clone, so I used a sunset photo I took on a recent Hawaii trip.

Then you click on the “Apply” button, and your photo transforms using the colors of the Hawaii image.

At that point, you’re not finished; it’s just a start, and Color Theory Pro brings up an adjustment panel that lets you make further changes in color balance and exposure to get your image the way you want it.

It’s actually quite easy, and my finished product was good.

With the manual mode, I used the same drone photo and the eyedropper tool in Photoshop. With Color Theory Pro running and with the controls set to complementary colors, the plug-in displayed a color palette based on my selection.

Then those colors can be applied to this or any photo, because they can be saved.

The author has created a video that can describe the process better than I can:

In Summary

Color Theory Pro is a clever piece of software that should enhance the workflow of any photographer. It makes the difficult work of adjusting color easier.

The clone feature we’ve seen before. There’s something similar in the Photoshop betas, and Luminar Neo has also added a color transfer function. I think the color cloning in this tool is better than the Photoshop beta Neural Color Transfer tool; it just seems more accurate in its placement of colors. The same goes for the Luminar Neo color transfer tool, which works well most of the time but has a tendency to go over the top on occasion.

There are a few things that would make Color Theory Pro even better. It needs a solid manual. The video tutorial is nice, but most users will want more. A lot more.

Also, the AIC adjustment panel needs a couple of changes, in my view. Adjustments are not smooth; you have to let go of the control to see them. Also, when you make an adjustment and want to go back to the defaults, the usual double-click does nothing. A double-click should return you to the defaults, as is standard with Adobe and other editing software.

Still, Color Theory Pro is a valuable tool that should find its way into many Photoshop users’ plug-in menus.

Buying Color Theory Pro

Color Theory Pro is available on the developer's website. The software is 27 euros, roughly $29 at the current conversion rate. It runs on both Windows and Macs (Apple Intel and M1/M2/M3).

Minor updates within the same version are free. Major upgrades have a cost, but the developer says updates will be very reasonable for existing customers.

I think Color Theory Pro is worth considering. It ran solidly and has some original new ideas.