Blown Highlights in BW

[watermelon]

Heya,

 

Are there blown highlights in this photo and if so how terrible are

they and what can be done?

 

Thanks a lot

 

http://www.photo.net/photo/3492269&size=lg

[watermelon]

Sorry, more specificaly on the man's head - not fussed about the Granny.

[melissa_w.___arizona_calif]

Have you fiddled with it in PS or something? Besides the blown highlights, the skin looks

really weird.

[gary_woodard]

Blown highlights lack any visual info, they are blown out kapoot, not there,

gone, not sure if even the mighty photoshop can pull out something not there.

[paul a. roid]

it's doctored already, what else do you expect...<br>

maybe (but only maybe) the original scan will reveal<br>

some more detail...

[al_kaplan1]

What did you shoot it with? You don't say if it was film or digital. If it's film it's most likely overdevelopment. Burn in the highlights througfh a low contrast filter should get some tone but the whole photo is contrasty. Need more information to really know what's going on.

[paul_sokal___dallas__tx]

Your caption says the pic was shot with a Nikon 6006, i.e. film. There are definitely blown highlights in the image you posted but we have no way of knowing if they're blown on the negative. Unless that was intentional with the PS manipulation, there's no way to know if PS can recover them. If they're blown on your original scan (put the eyedropper on the white part of the forehead and if it's 255.255.255 it's blown) then there is not way to recover data that doesn't exist. A better scan may do the trick if the negative isn't blown.

[fotografz]

Horrible scan. Bet there's tone in the neg.

[James G. Dainis]

It may not be blown but blocked highlights. Look at that area on the negative with a loupe and see if you can see any detail.

[craig_molway]

With film the ol' addage has always bee, "when in doubt, blow it out" because highlights are almost always recoverable in the darkroom. You might want to try scanning the negative at different exposures and combining the images to a final higher tonal range photo. If you find that the highlights are indeed gone try this:

 

http://tinyurl.com/48258

 

A while back I found a link about adding tri-x grain to digital photos (might have been photo.net forums). I have found in instances of irretrievable highlights (ie. slide film or digital) it has worked in a pinch.

 

I have taken the libery to edit your photo via this technique as a demonstration. Hope you don't mind.

[steve_swinehart]

You don't say what type of film this is shot on. If it's black and white negative film, there is still detail in the highlights. Whether you can recover them digitally will depend upon your PS skills. They can be printed using traditional B&W darkroom techniques quite easily.

 

If this is a B&W conversion from color film, then it depends upon whether the film is negative or tranparency. If it's color negative film, you will still have detail. If it's transparency film - then they're gone.

[aaron l]

There's info on the neg there for sure. The scan is too contrasty and it looks like Curves were used way too strongly. Scan it in a neutral mode.