I made a Cat in the Hat cake this past weekend for my grandson. The cake really came out nice, (or at least I think it did) and I would like to post pictures of it, but none of the pictures that either I took, my son took, or my daughter took show the true color red that was on the cake. Either it has a pinkish tone to it, or orange tone. Does anyone else have this problem with the color red? I don't want to post any pictures, because I don't want people looking and thinking that I intended the icing to be pink or orange. We played around with the pictures to photoshop them with more of a red tone. To me, they still have an orange cast to them. Any suggestions?

I'm no pro, but it sounds like a lighting problem to me. I totally want to make a photobox for taking pictures of my cakes.

http://www.digital-photography-school.com/how-to-make-a-inexpensive-light-tent

Thanks Traci. That box is a great idea! My son said its the lighting also, but on his camera, red looked orange, and on my daughters red looked almost a hot pink. My sister thinks that red is probably just a hard color to photograph. I'm so bummed about this. I made his head out of rkt which is a first for me.

cameras have minds of their own! the same camera can skew colors even when taking the pictures from the same position, depending on their settings. like the traci suggested, a light box is one of the best ways you can control the environment. even a bad camera can take good pictures as long as you have good lighting.

best thing about digital cameras is that you can take a ton of pictures without much consequence! take many and give a close look at them on the camera as you take them. use the camera picture viewer to zoom in on the shots you took and see if it captures the important parts well. it's also important to zoom in with the viewer to make sure what you wanted is actually in focus!

you could also try using a computer program like infram-view (that's a free one to download) or probably your computer already has some basic program to edit your pictures. try opening up one of your photos on your computer and see if your pictures program says "edit photo" on the tool bar. usually when editing a picture, even the simplest programs have some control thing to adjust the tint, brightness and saturation of the colors in the picture.
Lol, usually the only editing I do is getting a picture right side up! You should post it anyways and you can advise us the veiwers to adjust our monitors until the red is looking right,

Thanks ladies for your input. We tried on my computer and on a free site called picnik for editing photos. I guess we got them as good as they will get. Oh well. Thats reallly funny, forwarning everyone of the color. Thing is though, I don't know if I would even bother looking at a pink or orange Cat in the Hat! lol

Okay, I braved up and posted the Cat in the Hat pictures. I tried correcting the colors as best as I could. Thank you.
Kathy

I bought a new camera because of this same problem-the old camera kept changing the colors of the cakes.

I think your red looks fine, and the cake is really cute!! For future reference, you might want to try what I do when you have a 'photo shoot'. I have one of those tri-fold boards kids use for science projects, and about 3 yards of black material. (I need to get a lighter color also, so the darker cakes don't fade into the background. I set it up for my backdrop, and always take the pictures during daylight - usually morning light. I don't use flash, and I usually have the overhead lights turned off too. And I take dozens of pictures just to get a few to come out. Hope this helps in the future.

Sent you PM regarding your image.

Thanks for the tip about the fabric for the tri-fold board Connie1027. I've tried the board on its' own but didn't like it. I'll get some light and dark fabric tomorrow!

Connie
I am also going to thank you for the tip. I'll have to give it a try.
Kathy

Fabric can be expensive. If you don't find any cheap enough, try looking for a flat sheet. The sheet will also be wider than fabric if you something larger than a twin size plus you don't have to hem raw edges like you would with fabric.

Discoloured colours are normally a white balance issue. Have a look through your manual and find out how to set the w.b. to manual and see if that helps any.

Thanks Sara
Wow, all these great ideas and tips. Very much appreciated.
Kathy

It's not that red is a hard color to photograph. All your cameras color balances are probably not set correctly. But I know, camera manuals are just not easy to go through. That's why (I know this for a fact) some people just end up buying a new camera!

Most of my cake photos are taken near a large picture window at certain times of day. I am finding that natural light, with no inside lighting used, does best with cakes. Also, I need to consider what is in the back ground. I have an antique enamel work table which is brown and gold It will turn every cake photo I take, yellow!
I play around with either a white back drop cloth, a black plastic table cloth I purchase from the dollar store or a large navy blue drop cloth.
I also have to consider the time of day. In the early morning hours I have great sunshine coming through the window. Sometimes I stand to I am reflecting the light from the window. On one cake, I actually had to stand in the way of the light, to get the photo right.
Flouresent lighting can also wreak havoc with cake photos.
So far the hardest photos to take have been either cakes that have yellow in it, or light purple.
I love the digital camera! I take about 40 photos to get 2 or 3 good ones.

I hope this helps.

I found twin sheets on sale at walmart for $2.00 in black. Perfect back-drop. Just throw it over some chairs, get in front of a window, and there ya go. Simple.