If you’re trying to fix weird skin tones in Lightroom, you’re one of many who struggle with this problem.
Skin is the first thing people notice in a photo. When it looks slightly off, everything feels off.
Too orange.
Too pink.
Too grey.
Or strangely green in the shadows.
When you need to fix weird skin tones in Lightroom, the problem is rarely dramatic.
It’s usually a small adjustment made in the wrong order.
Once you understand the workflow, skin tones become much easier to control.
Start With White Balance First
Most people head straight to the HSL panel.
It feels logical. If skin looks orange, reduce orange. If it looks red, reduce red.
But if white balance isn’t correct first, you’re adjusting colour on top of unstable colour. That almost always makes things worse.
Go back to the Basic panel.
Look at Temperature and Tint.
Too warm creates artificial orange tones.
Too cool makes skin look flat.
Too much magenta makes skin pink and blotchy.
Too much green makes it look dull or sickly.
Make small adjustments. Two to five points can completely shift how skin feels.
If colour still feels strange after adjusting white balance, you may want to read Why Your Lightroom Colours Look Wrong Even When Exposure Is Fine. Sometimes the issue isn’t warmth at all. It’s tonal balance.
Balance Exposure Before Refining Colour
Exposure comes next.
Skin that is too dark can look muddy.
Skin that is too bright can lose texture and appear patchy.
Adjust Exposure first.
Then Highlights and Shadows.
Then Contrast.
Create a calm, balanced base.
Colour behaves differently depending on contrast. If you try to fix skin tones before stabilising exposure, you’ll constantly chase the edit.
If editing order feels confusing, I explain it clearly in A Simple Lightroom Editing Order That Instantly Improves Your Results.
Use Masking for Subtle Corrections
Mixed lighting is one of the biggest causes of weird skin tones.
Indoor portraits especially can combine warm artificial light with cooler window light. That creates uneven colour across the face.
Instead of adjusting the entire image, use Select Subject.
Inside that mask, make tiny adjustments to Temperature or Tint.
Keep it subtle.
You are balancing light, not repainting skin.
This single step often fixes uneven tones without affecting the background.
Refine Carefully in HSL
Now you can go to HSL.
Skin tones mostly sit in Red, Orange, and a small amount of Yellow.
If skin looks too orange, reduce Orange saturation slightly.
If it looks too pink, reduce Red saturation slightly.
If it feels too yellow, reduce Yellow saturation slightly.
Avoid dramatic slider movements.
Heavy reductions create lifeless, grey skin.
You are refining, not rescuing.
Check Clarity, Texture and Dehaze
This step is often overlooked.
High Clarity exaggerates colour variation.
High Texture emphasises pores.
Heavy Dehaze increases contrast in unnatural ways.
If skin looks harsh or uneven, reduce Clarity or Texture slightly and reassess.
I wrote about this in The One Lightroom Slider That Quietly Ruins Your Colours, because small overcorrections can completely shift how skin tones appear.
A Simple Skin Tone Workflow
When you want to fix weird skin tones in Lightroom, follow this order:
1. Adjust exposure
2. Correct white balance
3. Balance highlights and shadows
4. Apply preset
5. Mask and refine skin
6. Use HSL gently
Most skin tone problems are workflow problems.
Once the base is stable, colour becomes predictable.
Skin is incredibly sensitive to small colour shifts.
That’s why it feels frustrating when it looks wrong.
But when you correct white balance first, balance exposure second, and refine gently instead of aggressively, everything becomes easier.
Fix the foundation.
Then refine.
And your edits will start to feel natural and consistent.
If you want a simple reference you can come back to while editing, I’ve put together a short PDF called 5 Fast Fixes for Flat Photos. It walks through the most common issues beginners run into and shows how to fix them cleanly, without overcomplicating things.
If you’d rather not wrestle with an edit yourself, I also offer simple photo editing help through Buy Me a Coffee. You can upload a photo and I’ll edit it for you, or help you understand what’s going wrong so you can fix it next time.
If there’s something in Lightroom you’re struggling to fix or understand, feel free to leave a comment. I read them all and use real questions to shape future posts.
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