Craig Ferguson Images - Latest Comments in A Photoshop Tutorial – Levels

Re: A Photoshop Tutorial – Levels

cfimages — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 19:04:16 -0000

Glad it was useful. Thank you.

Re: A Photoshop Tutorial – Levels

Jeff — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 07:11:55 -0000

Thank you for such a wonderful tutorial. Keep up the good work!

Re: A Photoshop Tutorial – Levels

cfimages — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 18:49:27 -0000

Yeah, it's permanent if you save as a jpeg (and each time you open and resave a jpeg you slightly corrupt the file), but you can save as a TIFF or PSD and keep the layers intact. It creates a bigger file size, but with external 1TB harddrives around NT$3600 (US$110) bigger file size is not something that I worry about. Thanks for the comment.

Re: A Photoshop Tutorial – Levels

cfimages — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 18:46:12 -0000

I get it. Sorry for the confusion - I thought you meant using Auto-Levels separately. Since Lightroom was released, I find that I only really use PS for some portrait retouching and noise plug-ins. I don't think I've ever thought to try Auto Levels on a layer.

Re: A Photoshop Tutorial – Levels

InvestorBlogger — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 12:01:21 -0000

Wow! I'm scouring this article... the layer structure... it's permanent if I make a jpeg... I think.

Re: A Photoshop Tutorial – Levels

Darren Melrose — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 09:57:30 -0000

Maybe I am confused, or I wasn't quite clear. I meant using auto levels on the layer; it would be no more destructive than whatever choices the user made, since it is on a layer. I rarely use auto levels as a ending point, but it is often something I try as a starting point. The reason I mentioned the auto setting, is that is when I seem to see the most obvious colour shifts, which is what the Luminance blending mode really helps combat.

Re: A Photoshop Tutorial – Levels

cfimages — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 03:52:16 -0000

Thanks. The odd thing is that since Lightroom was released I find I rarely use Photoshop.

Re: A Photoshop Tutorial – Levels

Expatriate Games — Wed, 18 Feb 2009 03:02:04 -0000

Dude, that's cool of you to take make the time to put this together. I absolutely agree with the non-destructive approach. I learned the hard way and only wish I had read this two years ago!

Re: A Photoshop Tutorial – Levels

cfimages — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 18:34:39 -0000

Thanks Darren. Good tips on the blending mode. I purposely left Auto-Levels out of this tutorial because I want to encourage good non-destructive habits from the beginning. Of course one could always use auto-levels on a duplicated layer I guess.

Re: A Photoshop Tutorial – Levels

Darren Melrose — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 11:11:04 -0000

This is a helpful post, especially for newer PS users. A more advanced addition I would have, and one which is very easily done, is to change the blending mode of the layers level to Luminosity from Normal. This can help to avoid the colour shifts that can occur when you make levels (or curves) adjustments. Especially when you use auto-levels (not always a bad starting point) this can relieve a lot of headaches.