PSE4, 2 Q'S.....

[flaclick]

Hi
I am new to the world of RAW, therefore, I am also new to the Raw Converter in PSE4. I have 2 questions:

1. When I am in the Raw Converter, and I am manually adjusting Exposure and Shadows, etc, what is the histogram on the top suppose to look like? For example, when I get into the Editor phase of E4, and I do an Adjustment Layer for Levels, I know that the black arrow needs to be moved to the rightunder the beginning curve of the mound, and the white arrow needs to be moved left so it's under the beginning of the mound. But when I'm in the Converter, I see the histogram and all the colors moving and I'm not sure what my goal is????

2. This has happened twice to me. I have a Raw file in editor, I do my edits, I flatted the image (maybe 2 or 3 times during the process), and save it as a TIFF file. When I go back into the Organizer, I see the new TIFF filename, but the image isn't showing anything except a big black box? Has this happened to anyone else?

Any help greatly appreciated......

Ruth

[DavidW]

Try the following recipe.

Adjust White Balance if it needs adjusting - I typically import a White Balance from a WhiBal shot, which on CS2 is done via Bridge. I don't know how you do this on Elements.

Set Exposure to 0.00, Shadows to 0, Brightness to 50, Contrast to +25 and Saturation to 0 - on CS2 you can save partial settings which allows this to be selected from the drop-down menu, but I'm not sure whether the same is possible on Elements.

Exposure basically sets the white point - adjust that first. Then adjust brightness (which pulls the histogram towards the right hand end as you drag the slider right) and contrast (which pulls the histogram towards the edges as you drag the slider right) in that order. Go back and set shadows, which sets the black point. Adjust saturation, then tweak to taste.

If you can, check the boxes for Shadows and Highlights, which shows which pixels are being clipped. Preview should be checked when you're adjusting - that means show the current settings (unchecking it shows the results of the previous settings).


I can't help with Question 2 - I'm not familiar with Elements.



David

[TheSteveMadden]

... what is the histogram on the top suppose to look like? For example, when I get into the Editor phase of E4, and I do an Adjustment Layer for Levels, I know that the black arrow needs to be moved to the rightunder the beginning curve of the mound, and the white arrow needs to be moved left so it's under the beginning of the mound. But when I'm in the Converter, I see the histogram and all the colors moving and I'm not sure what my goal is????



Ruth, there really is no histogram which is appropriate for all pictures. You are adjusting for correct brightness and contrast depending on your subject and lighting, not trying to make the histogram a specific shape.

If I'm shooting at the beach, I may have so little shadow detail that I wouldn't want to try to use the base of the mountain as a guide. The same would apply to highlights if the brightest element of my picture is correctly exposed skin. In that case, the right hand side of the apparent mountain may correctly be 1 exposure level down from the right side of the histogram.

To simulate moving the arrows as you do in E4, you would use the exposure and shadows sliders. Here's a tip: hold down the Alt key (windows) while adjusting those sliders to see where you might be clipping highlights or shadows.

[DavidW]

Though a few of the details are argued about, this (http://www.luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/understanding-series/understanding-histograms.shtml) is a helpful guide to histograms.



David

[BrianEE93]

The black box on TIFFs is a known error from day one and Adobe has yet to fix it. They will probably fix it by selling us an upgrade to PSE 5.0:(

[flaclick]

Just another question, I have my Highlights and Shadows checked on so I can see immediately where they are in the picture. When I use the Exposure slider and use the Alt Key, and I see the clipped areas, what do I do then? Do I keep moving the slider to the right or left, is the main point to eliminate them from the image?

Thanks for all your help.
Ruth

[In2Photos]

Just another question, I have my Highlights and Shadows checked on so I can see immediately where they are in the picture. When I use the Exposure slider and use the Alt Key, and I see the clipped areas, what do I do then? Do I keep moving the slider to the right or left, is the main point to eliminate them from the image?

Thanks for all your help.
Ruth

When adjusting exposure I try to eliminate any white areas. This is where all three channels are clipped. Sometimes this requires too much decreasing so I just try to eliminate as much as possible. For shadows I try to bring the shadows up so that black is just barely visible while holding down the alt key. This would also be where all three channels clip.

From here I adjust brightness and contrast to taste, but do most of my saturation adjustment in the calibrate tab or in CS2's hue/saturation adjustment.

[flaclick]

Thanks Mike. I'll give it another try.

R