More About Using Levels

Why Use Levels Instead of Brightness and Contrast ... or one of the Auto Adjustments?

Reason #1 - It works better. Levels uses a Histogram (think of it as a traditional bar chart if you like) which is a graphic interpretation of your image. It has nothing to do with the content of the image, or the actual colors in the image. It simply sees the image as shades of gray and displays them so that you can see where the maximum black and white points lie on an absolute scale ranging from pure black to pure white.

Reason #2 - It's not dependent on the accuracy of your monitor. This is important because - believe me - no matter how good a monitor you have it is probably not 100% accurate in color interpretation.

Reason #3 - Setting the black point (by moving the left slider over to the spot where your image's information begins) creates a field of true black within which the actual colors will stand out as they should. (Think of it this way: If you hold a brightly colored object up in front of a gray wall, the colors look less that brilliant. Right? But hold that same object in front of a black surface, and - BAM! - the colors really stand out.

Reason#4 - Setting the white point (right hand slider) is somewhat subjective. If, say, an image is meant to be muted and subdued you wouldn't want to pull the white slider all the way over to the point where your image information begins, because this would probably cause the image to lose it's subtle tones and mood.

But for normal images, setting the white point at the exact place where your image information begins will bring the brightness and contrast - not to mention the colors - into perfect balance.

Reason #5 - To repeat: None of those other adjustments - Brightness, Contrast, Auto Color, Auto Levels, etc., allows you to retain creative control of your image. They do what they do "globally" without any ability judge the overall quality or luminance of your image.

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