Very Good Contrast Technique for Photoshop

<p>This is a great little technique for improving contrast in an image. It seems to add a nice overall bite to an image without blowing highlights or muddying shadows.<br>

<a href="http://digital-photography-school.com/a-quick-and-effective-way-to-enhance-contrast-in-photoshop">http://digital-photography-school.com/a-quick-and-effective-way-to-enhance-contrast-in-photoshop</a>#<br>

Only criticism is the use of auto-levels, I would suggest sticking to manual adjustment. I've tried it many of my own images and in almost every case the change was positive.<br>

Enjoy</p>

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<p>Nice tip, thanks for sharing.</p>

<p>It is an interesting approach and another proof of however you do something in Photoshop, somebody else will have found another path to something that is at least similar. I've been using the program back to version 2.5 and I am still learning new things. I can't say I'm always an Adobe fan, but this really is a gem of a program.</p>

<p>In the same vein, I sometimes add a sketch effect to add crispness to an already-detailed photo. The result isn't always positive, but when it works, people will be wondering whether you used an 8x10 view camera.<br>

1) Duplicate your original image and desaturate it. Duplicate the desaturated image and invert it. You've now got three images in Layers: your original, a black-and-white positive, and a black-and-white negative.<br>

2) Click on the negative layer and set it to Color Dodge blend mode, yielding a white blank, either featureless or with a few dribs and drabs. <br>

3) Now apply Gaussian blur to a fairly low radius to get a line image of the contours in your original, and Merge your negative and positive layers.<br>

4) You may want to fudge this image in any of a number of ways. Perhaps you want to get thinner lines with a Levels, setting black and white points closer together, or get rid of the spots with Despeckle, or soften it ever so slightly with Gaussian blur. <em>De gustibus</em> , and all that.<br>

5) Merge it over your original with Darken or Multiply.<br>

People do something similar by duping the original layer, running the High Pass filter, and blending it on the original with Soft Light. If you've got detail in the veins standing out on your model's eyeballs, no harm in making it sit up and scream.</p>

<p>I'm agreeing with JDM, been using the software for a decade now. Still finding new bits and other ways of achieving the same results. Thanks for the contribution.</p>

Does anybody have a low-contrast image that I could try <a href="http://digital-photography-school.com/a-quick-and-effective-way-to-enhance-contrast-in-photoshop">this</a> out <a href="http://digital-photography-school.com/a-quick-and-effective-way-to-enhance-contrast-in-photoshop#comment-55783">in GIMP</a>, along with simple Curves adjustment, "Local Contrast Enhancement", and <a href="http://registry.gimp.org/node/17151">Maximize Local Contrast</a>? Or, how how do I go about producing a low contrast image of my own (seriously), shoot during overly cloudy day?

(About shooting low contrast image, I should mention that I have Sony A700 camera (digital) & some good, some ok lenses.)

<p>Hey, that's fantastic, I have just given it a try on a couple of shots that were a bit high key and the results were great. <br>

Thanks for the tip.</p>

<p>Thanks Milo!<br>

-Greg</p>

<p>Nice tip for a quick fix.<img src=" alt="" /></p><div></div>