Shards

I received several emails recently asking me to explain how to use Photoshop's "Levels" window. This is something I've brought up before, and is without a doubt one of the most useful and effective tools in Photoshop, particularly for those who scan in drawings or other work not created digitally.

The Levels option (found under Image > Adjust, or by pressing command-L) allows you to control the varying levels of the shades and colors in your image. At it's most basic (and often most useful) point, it can dramatically improve the contrast and impression of your image. You should never ever ever use Photoshop's "Adjust Brightness/Contrast" option. While this will also adjust the image contrast, it is extremely limited, and you will be sacrificing immense amounts of control over your end result. And as an artist, giving up control of your work to a computer program is not usually a good idea.

Upon choosing the Levels option, a new window will pop up. Now, for the sake of this example, let's say that the image below is the one we have scanned in (click it for a larger version). It was done in pencil, and didn't turn out very dark. It may have become even lighter when we scanned it. Thus, our Levels window is going to look like the one beside it.

This image...

...has this sort of levels graph.

This graph basically shows you how much of each shade there is in your image. The far right side of the graph indicates the white level, the far left is the black level, and everything in between represents the midtone levels. As you can see, this image has a whole lotta white (the entire background), and every other shade is also very bright. There is nothing darker than about 60% - 70%. While there are always exceptions, a good image will usually contain pure black and pure white. With this instance, we've got plenty of white, but we need to bring up the black level. We do this by grabbing that black arrow on the left (the one right under the graph, not the one at the very bottom) and dragging it. If we drag it all the way up to where the graph tapers down to nothing, then we are sure to have at least a little bit of pure black.

This is what it will look like...

...when you shift the graph like this.

Keep in mind that every image will have a different Levels graph, so there can be no "magic number" or specific distance that will always look good. But you should be able to see your image update as you move the arrows, so just adjust it until it looks the way you want. If you aren't sure, aim for a graph that looks something like the one below, where the graph data extends completely across, touching both sides and containing at least some pure black and pure white. As you can see from the second image, this is a great improvement, and the drawing looks much better with the increased contrast.

This is a pretty healthy Levels graph.

The Levels window has countless uses and applications, but this basic one is something that can be applied to every work. And it is simple enough that it can be used by those unfamiliar with Photoshop's advanced features.

Hopefully that will help someone out. As always, I will field your further questions and Fanart thoughts in this area, so send anything you feel like discussing to fanart@rpgamer.com. Be sure to keep working on your Ico projects, too!

What occurred in the light, goes on in the dark.