Digital BW, The Print

Nick. I'd be interesting in getting more details about how you go 
about increasing contrast using the dodge/burn tool. Have you seen 
any noise/artifact problems coming up from having to work in 8-bit 
mode to do your burning? Also, doing a quick, unscientific 
comparison, I notice that darkening a bit of sky (viewed at 100% in 
PS) by curves or levels does seem to increase graininess as compared 
to darkening it by using the burn tool OR by decreasing brightness. 
(I'd be interested in hearing what other people have experienced in 
this regard.) Using the burn tool and decreasing brightness seem to 
have about the same effect on grain. And if that is indeed the case, 
then it would seem to be easier and more accurate, at least for large 
tracts of cloudless sky, etc. to create a layer mask on a 8-bit copy, 
save the selection, then import it into the original 16-bit image and 
then darken the selection using decrease in brightness.

Chris Hargens 

  --- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, Bill Morse 
<willym@b...> wrote:
> Hi Nick-
> 
> A very interesting (if painstaking) technique! How are you scanning 
these
> images?
> 
> 
> Bill Morse
> PhotoProspect
> Cambridge, MA USA
> 
> 
> on 6/6/03 11:24 AM, nick90290 wrote:
> 
> > Hi Alessandro
> > 
> > Thanks for the compliments on the photos. Especially considering 
you
> > saw a bunch of pokey little 3" inch images on the web. I'm very
> > flattered.
> > 
> > In response to your answer, firstly let me say I feel very foolish
> > and dumb having been using Levels at all to create the majority 
of my
> > contrast, since it was making many of my images way more grainy 
than
> > they ever needed to be.
> > 
> > The thing I found with levels is if you have a fairly grainy 
image to
> > begin with, you increase the contrast of each invidual 'blob' of
> > grain to the next. Obviously working in Curves is better and 
helps to
> > quite a degree. 
> > 
> > But what I now do - which is very painstaking, is try and create
> > nearly all my contrast in the image, down to the smallest detail,
> > through elaborate dodging and burning with the brush set to
> > mid-tones. 
> > That way, all the 'blobs' of grain are pretty similar to the 
original
> > flat scan one started with.
> > 
> > I was shocked at the difference it made when I started again from
> > scratch on a number of photos. Grainy photos done the old way at
> > 11"x14", when re-done using my new time-consuming method, looked
> > almost devoid of grain blown up to 20"x24". So when I did add more
> > overall contrast to the new image in Curves , it was only a pretty
> > small amount, that did little to make the image more grainy.
> > 
> > I should add that I only have this problem with grainy images - 
the
> > images shot on T-Max 100 (6x7 format) generally are grainless 
enough
> > that they can handle some crude levels layers.
> > 
> > Nick
> > 
> > ................................
> > 
> > 
> > 
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