| 67.
Adobe Photoshop CS2 - Controling Tonal Quality with the Curves
Tool
Article
67 of 100
Although
Levels and Curves are essentially the same tools, Curves allows
a more natural and flexible control over the process and therefore
tends to give better results (for most photographers). There
are quite a few Adobe Lightroom Beta users who are wondering
(out loud) why Adobe has re-invented the Curves process for
Lightroom and is not using the Curves tool available in Photoshop.
I must confess that I am also perplexed about this and hope
that Adobe has a change of heart. It is not always necessary
to re-invent the wheel, sometimes you can just put the old
car up on jacks, and move those expensive mags to the new
model in your garage.
-
Curves
Tool - default setting
Lighten
& Darken Adjustments -
To lighten an image you drag the center point of the diagonal
line to the left. To darken an image you drag the center point
of the diagonal line to the right. Just like in the Levels
tool you are moving the neutral gray point to a position that
allows for more or less pixels to represent the lighter or
darker part of the image.
Curve
Tool
- lighten image
Curve
Tool
- darken image
Contrast Adjustments -
To increase contrast you drag the end points of the diagonal
line horizontally towards the center (losing shadow and highlight
information). To decrease contrast you drag the end points
of the diagonal line vertically towards the center (reducing
the dynamic range so blacks are not really black and whites
are not really white).
Curve
Tool
- increase contrast.
Curve
Tool
- decrease contrast.
Using
the S shaped curve to maintain dynamic range
-
The trick here is to increase contrast without losing detail
and also to be able to decrease contrast without losing the
dynamic range. By introducing an S shaped curve into the equation
it is possible to increase contrast in one area while decreasing
it in another.
Curve
Tool -
increase contrast, using S shaped curve
Curve
Tool -
decrease contrast, using S shaped curve
P.S.
Please do not get upset if your personal experience and views
are different from my own. These opinions are mine exclusively
and do not reflect the views or policies of any of the manufacturers
mentioned in these articles ...... George
Mann |
