bw tones confused.

[bribrius]

There really isn't any way of increasing midrange tones in bw is there? kind of trying to understand this. I thought maybe if I adjust the white balance toward one side and then use a tint in post I would increase tones. But that really doesn't increase tones because I started with gray I will end up with gray. Just a different look of the grayscale. Thought of maybe a filter, but that would again change all the tones.
you cant really increase tones just bring them more to the front or make what is there more contrast right? Because if you slide to one side of the scale, you drop of the other side, you slide the other way you decrease on the far side. so you never actually increase tones but just try to find the center of the gray scale if you want the most midrange?

 

[paigew]

You can in tone curves

So, if you want brighter midtones, slightly pull up the curve in the middle (mid tone range). I do this to almost all my photos.

 

[limr]

Are you talking about midtones or contrast? You can adjust the levels of shadows/midtones/highlights as well as the contrast. And, as paige says, you can use curves as well.

 

[bribrius]

Are you talking about midtones or contrast? You can adjust the levels of shadows/midtones/highlights as well as the contrast. And, as paige says, you can use curves as well.

midtones. Taking a photo and getting more tones out of it. im confusing myself at the same time because Im simultaneously trying to wrap my head around this with light as well. Thinking of color, the less light or more diffused the dimmer the color. But as it gets dimmer the tones seem to even out and expand to the eye where as high color certain ones pronounce while others become secondary. so the more diffused the light in bw the more tones I can pull from the image? Not contrast, as that would pronounce certain tones and too far you would lose tones right? How would one attempt to pull the most out of the gray scale, the most tones. filter or tint, would just change all the tones.

 

[paigew]

no, you want directional light. The shadows and contrast need to be there, you need to bring them out.

see this recent blog post before/after

 

[bribrius]

You can in tone curves

So, if you want brighter midtones, slightly pull up the curve in the middle (mid tone range). I do this to almost all my photos.

not brighter so much. but more of the scale.

 

[Braineack]

i think it helps if you can define tone correctly.

I'll just leave this here: http://www.cambridgeincolour.com/tutorials/histograms1.htm

 

[paigew]

You can in tone curves

So, if you want brighter midtones, slightly pull up the curve in the middle (mid tone range). I do this to almost all my photos.

not brighter so much. but more of the scale.

well it works both ways. You can pull up/down shadows, midtones, and hightlights with the tone curve. A lot of people like making an "S" curve

 

[bribrius]

i think it helps if you can define tone correctly.

I'll just leave this here: Understanding Digital Camera Histograms: Tones and Contrast

so what im really trying to achieve is a near flat histogram right acrossed for the broadest range and avoid peaks. to start with.

 

[paigew]

i think it helps if you can define tone correctly.

I'll just leave this here: Understanding Digital Camera Histograms: Tones and Contrast

so what im really trying to achieve is a near flat histogram right acrossed for the broadest range and avoid peaks. to start with.

no, not at all. If the image has a lot of shadows/darks there will be a peak at the left side...conversely, if it is a bright photo it will have a peak on the right side of the histogram. I personally 'ignore' the histogram and just pay attention to the blinkies. (making sure not to blow out anything)

 

[Braineack]

so what im really trying to achieve is a near flat histogram right acrossed for the broadest range and avoid peaks. to start with.

peaks represent how much of a particular tone is in the photo. if the histogram is flat, then the image has the exactly same amount of tones throughout the image--A black to white gradient will have a flat histogram.

 

[bribrius]

so what im really trying to achieve is a near flat histogram right acrossed for the broadest range and avoid peaks. to start with.

peaks represent how much of a particular tone is in the photo. if the histogram is flat, then the image has the exactly same amount of tones throughout the iamge. A black to white graident will have a flat histogram.

oh. I was looking at this "The above image is an example which contains a very broad tonal range, with markers to illustrate where regions in the scene map to brightness levels on the histogram" In your link with the image. (very helpful btw) so I thought if It started low on one side raised slightly upward to a hill rounding in the middle and dropped off the other I hit the entire range, with the highest point in the middle so in theory should have the most even tones and most midtones. kind of like color but, well grayscale. For a more fluid photograph wide ranging and with lots of midtones..
and compared to the light, and my thoughts on diffusing light for more tones it made sense I guess. im probably still missing the boat here.

 

[bribrius]

hey, dont worry about it guys. ill play with it and figure it out self learn way. look at it ten times taking photos ill probably catch on because now im looking for it. And I dont think you can do what im asking anyway (make more tones) except when you first hit the shutter and that depends on what is in the frame. Either it is a broad range photo or it isnt. The rest seem to just move them or pronounce them not make more range. like I could pronounce the midrange but not really expand how far it reaches across the grayscale right?
the link helped a lot, kind of what I was thinking. Thanks for the curve too.

 

[Braineack]

you have a scale from 0-255 that you can work between.

 

[Ysarex]

so what im really trying to achieve is a near flat histogram right acrossed for the broadest range and avoid peaks. to start with.

peaks represent how much of a particular tone is in the photo. if the histogram is flat, then the image has the exactly same amount of tones throughout the iamge. A black to white graident will have a flat histogram.

oh. I was looking at this "The above image is an example which contains a very broad tonal range, with markers to illustrate where regions in the scene map to brightness levels on the histogram" In your link with the image. (very helpful btw) so I thought if It started low on one side raised slightly upward to a hill rounding in the middle and dropped off the other I hit the entire range, with the highest point in the middle so in theory should have the most even tones and most midtones. kind of like color but, well grayscale. For a more fluid photograph wide ranging and with lots of midtones..
and compared to the light, and my thoughts on diffusing light for more tones it made sense I guess. im probably still missing the boat here.

I may be able to help. I was working on an example for my class this afternoon concerning exposure and the photos I took may shed some light on what you're wrestling with here. Right now here's the photos along with their histograms.



The left photo is a different exposure while the middle and right photos are two versions of the same exposure; the photos were taken less than a minute apart. Your concern has to do with tone response and the tone response in these three photos is very different one to the next. As Braineack noted in an 8 bit JPEG you have a fixed range of 256 steps from black at 0 and white at 255. If you look at the histograms you'll see that the left photo extends across the full range as does the right photo. The middle photo however falls a little short of the left (black) corner.

It's late and I'm calling it a night but in the meantime if you see this before I check back in the morning you can consider the differences you see between the three photos and I can elaborate then.

Joe