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01/01/2005 05:34:32 PM · #1 |
I had written this up for someone today. Since it only requires pasting it again, I just thought I'd share. Most of you probably know how to do this anyway, but for those of you that don't...
Here's a good way set black, white, and gray points in an
image.
First, open your image in PS. Be sure to always work on a
duplicate. Then go to Image/Adjustments/Threshold. The picture
will turn into a black and white mess. No worries. First move the
slider to the left (as far as you can) until it turns mostly white
but there's still a black speck big enough to click on. (Your
cursor will look like an eyedropper) Once you have a black speck,
hold down your shift key and click on it. This will place a little
circular icon on the image. It's a placeholder and will be
marked "1". Next, move the slider to the right until most of the
image is black. Find a small white speck big enough to click on,
hold down shift, and click on it. This will lay down
placeholder "2". Do not click okay. Instead, click cancel. The
placeholders will still be on the image even though you can't see
them. What you just did was located the blackest and whitest parts
of the image. Now we're going to tell PS that, "Hey, this right
here is suppose to be black, that over there is suppose to be white,
and this is suppose to be gray." Now, go to
Image/Adjustments/Levels. At the bottom right of the Levels window
you will see three eyedroppers. The first one is for black, the
middle for gray, and the third is for white. Click on the first
(black) eyedropper and then click in the center of placeholder 1.
The image colors will change slightly. Now click on the third
eyedropper, the white one, and click in the center of placeholder
2. The colors will again change. (If you aren't noticing changes
in color, nothing is wrong. It just may mean it needs little
adjusting.) Last, choose the second eyedropper to find the gray
point. We don't have a placeholder for this so you'll just have to
find something in the image that should be gray. Not something that
looks gray now, but something that is suppose to show up as gray.
Clicking on different shades of gray will tint the image in
different ways - warmer, cooler, etc. After that, just click OK
and you're done...unless you want to tweak other things.
A shortcut - Instead of going through Threshold and putting down
placeholders, you can just go right to Levels (or Curves) and use
the eyedroppers in the same way but you'll just have to guess at
what is black and what is white. I mostly use the shortcut because
the points are pretty clear in most images. If it's not clear, then
I'll use Threshold to get the most accuracy.
Jen
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01/01/2005 06:02:06 PM · #2 |
Sounds interesting. I'd like to know how to do that in Paint Shop Pro. I think it has no placeholders. And in the levels menu there are only two sliders. Maybe anybody knows how to the same in PSP (9) ?
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01/01/2005 06:13:04 PM · #3 |
Butterfly Sis,
Thanks for the bit of extra trouble you took to post this here. I'm one of those that will be helped by this, and I really appreciate the tutorial. Oh, and Happy New Year!
Ray
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01/01/2005 06:17:23 PM · #4 |
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01/01/2005 11:41:53 PM · #5 |
You're welcome, nova.
Gauti - Thanks for posting that. My bad. I should've looked there first.
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01/04/2005 12:49:10 PM · #6 |
What do you use this for? I am always interested in learning new Photoshop techniques, but I dont understand what kind of effect this will give you.
Jen |
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01/04/2005 03:14:34 PM · #7 |
Jen,
It's not so much an "effect" as it is a quick and relatively precise way to adjust some of the image parameters.
Robt.
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01/04/2005 05:34:10 PM · #8 |
Read your post there Butterfly, and my initial impression was "looks a complicated way to do things, I usually just drag the sliders in the levels whatsit".
Anyhow, thought I'd humour you and had a go at an old photo I'd done that to. It was a photo of a huge concrete (nice grey) Buddah, with an orange sash over him.
Worked a treat and came up better than I had it ... and only took a few more seconds to do.
Nice tip, thanks :)
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