Resetting Output levels

[mikemeister_admin]

In a previous post and in many articles in photo magazines I have read that to force shadow and highlight area it is desireable to set shadow=10 and highlight = 240. If the default setting in PSE4 Levels Command is set 10/240 what affect does this have using Curvemeister ?

What is your opinion on this setting.

Thanks Joe S

[-default]

Hi Joe,

This is an excellent question.  The values you cite are reasonable ones.

Curvemeister defaults to setting the highlight to RGB(255,255,255), and the shadow to RGB(0,0,0).  Combined with the technique of fine tuning the position of the shadow and highlight point, this tends to give a good tonal range to the image, and for the beginner's class I leave it at that.

That said, I have often considered changing these defaults to something more conservative, perhaps RGB(10,10,10) and RGB(245,245,245).  In the beginner's class I find myself reminding students that highlight detail needs special attention.  Using more conservative shadow and highlight values would help with this issue for beginners, and I would not recommend Curvemeister's default values for print, or for fine art images.

There are settings for these in the curvemeister settings, and you may also define pins for shadow and highlight.  The intermediate class, when it starts, will cover this and other issues relating to shadow and highlight.

Mike