[Revival]

For Adobe Photoshop 5.5 Can someone tell me what the major differences for Dodge\Burn options for: Midshadows \ Shadows \ Highlights ...

On the tutorial on this site they tell you to use Highlights with Dodge tool, but if you want to darken things with the Burn tool, would you also use highlets or something more like shadows ?

Thanks.
Revival

[Funfetus]

If you're using the tool on dark areas, set it to "shadows", for midtones, set it to "midtones", for light areas, set it to "highlights". Simple.

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Funfetus
iCE VGA Division
http://www.funhousedigital.com

[Muzman]

I depends what colours you want to get with it.
I have it on highlights for burning and dodgeing most of the time. That just seems to generally lighten or darken a spot (unless it's already really dark or light).
Burning and dodging midtones can have some really weird effects, and throw the colour right off.

anyway, it all makes a lot more sense if you know how it works.
This is my understanding;
there are 256 levels in RGB colour, from really dark to pure light. Check in the colour picker; from top to bottom of the big box, the y axis, are the levels. (x axis is saturation; I think)
Photoshop tries to emulate the photography exposure tricks of burning and dodgeing (in the lab this is done by loosely masking areas of a picture during slow development; a large mask- big piece of cardboard with a hole in it- is a dodge, a small mask -thin piece of wire with a cardboard disk on the end- is a burn)
So I reckon, for more control over digital images, Photoshop broke up the levels into three sections -highlights-midtones-shadows-, so folk could decide which colours are affected by the tool.
So, dodgeing highlights only lightens colours that fall into the upper third of the levels, burning highlights darkens those colours that fall into the upper third of the levels.

Does that all make any sense?

Disclaimer: I'm no expert, so I dunno how accurate this is. Also, I don't think Burn and Dodge only work on levels, but I think -highlights, midtones, shadows- is a level based option for the tools. If I'm wrong, see above. :P

[Tinusch]

From what I've noticed, this is what each setting does:

Midtones: For burning, this seems to just darken the color you're burning. For dodging, it simply lightens the color you're dodging.

Shadows: For burning, this one is weird. It darkens to red and black. I suppose it can be useful for very sharp shadows. For dodging, this is the setting I use most often. It gradually dodges to white, which creates a good shine effect.

Highlights: This is what I usually use for shadows when I burn. It gradually burns to a gray/black shadow. It's good for creating depth and well-defned shadows. For highlighting, it seems to lighten to the midway-point on that color's spectrum, if that makes sense. For example, if I use highlight dodge on an orange color, it seems to dodge to a yellowish-tan color. It's good for dodging skin.

The way it works out for me is that midtones is for creating the lightness/darkness on an object, just so you can see where the shadows are and for some minor detailing work. Shadows I use only dodge for, to create very well-defined lighting and shines. For highlights I use only burn, as it creates a very nice dark shadowy effect.

Sorry for being so choppy and incoherent, it's a tough subject to explain.

[Tinusch]

This should explain it better than I can:

[img]http://tinusch.dhs.org/dodgeandburn.jpg[img/]

[Tinusch]

Sorry, here it is:

[Revival]

Hey thanks! That was really helpful ...