What is the difference between curves and levels in photoshop

Coming to you from Aaron Nace with Phlearn , this fantastic video tutorial will show you the difference between Curves and Levels in Photoshop. Curves and Levels are two of the most powerful tools in the application.

You might think of these tools as being used for adjusting things like exposure or the shadows or highlights, but their capabilities actually go much further. By separating the adjustments into the individual red, green, and blue color channels, you can also quickly and easily perform color correction or color grading.

If the colors in your image are dull or muted , you can increase the saturation to make them look more vivid. On the other hand, you can reduce the saturation to make the colors less vivid.

If you remove the saturation completely, it will produce a black-and-white , or grayscale , image. Then click and drag the Saturation slider in the Properties panel to increase or decrease the saturation. Drag the slider in the interactive below to adjust the saturation of the image. Careful, though! Too much saturation will cause the image to lose detail.

For best results, we recommend using the Chrome web browser with these interactives. Increasing the saturation can sometimes look a bit unnatural. Vibrance lets you boost the saturation for the parts of the image that are less colorful without oversaturating the parts that are already colorful. Take the saturation to the highest and lowest settings to see the effect. Try to find the setting that looks best for the image.

As we mentioned above, removing the saturation completely by setting it to will create a black-and-white image. However, this method doesn't give you much control over how the black-and-white version will look.

For better results, you can create a Black and White adjustment layer. Because black-and-white photos don't have colors, the tones the different shades of gray are especially important.

A Black and White adjustment layer allows you to control how the different colors are mixed to create specific tones, which can make a significant difference in how the final image looks. We recommend trying different options from the Preset menu until you find one that works well for the image.

You can then make small adjustments to the individual colors as needed. Some images may require more specialized corrections, which can be difficult to make if you don't have a lot of experience with Photoshop. Fortunately, there are several automatic adjustment tools you can use to improve your images. In the original image below, the snow has a blueish tint. After using the Auto Color command, the snow looks white. You'll find a few auto-correction tools, including Auto Color , in the Image menu.

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December 21, curves tool , photoshop , working with colors Leave a comment. Many retouching artists will agree that the Curves tool is one of the best to use for color grading, but if your retouching workflow is limited to Lightroom or Capture One, you may not be too familiar with the Creative Retouching , Fundamentals , Video Tutorial.

December 26, creative retouching , photoshop , photoshop special effect Leave a comment. Are you bored with the same old portraits, are you in a creative funk? Can Curves do everything Levels can do? Yes, even though they appear different, every control you have in Levels is also in Curves. However, Curves can also do much more than Levels.

How is Curves different than Levels? Levels has just three control points black, white and midpoint and it is a single axis adjustment. Curves allows you to place multiple control points and each point can move on two axes. What are the advantages of Curves? Multiple control points can be used to adjust some tones while protecting others. Contrast can be increased without clipping shadows or highlights. The targeted adjustment tool in Curves can be used to select and adjust tones right on the image.