megalomania
December 23rd, 2004, 03:51 AM
I am trying some advanced tricks to get my photo scans of text to look better. One way is to use the magic wand tool to select a portion of background and export as a new layer. I adjust the levels and the contrast on this new layer, and I again select it with the magic wand tool. This time I invert the selection and create a new layer. What I end up with is a faint ghost outline of the original text.
The problem I am trying to address is the degradation of the outermost portion of the letters. In an extreme closeup the letters actually look like a dark skeleton, surrounded by a medium gray, surrounded by a very light gray, surrounded by medium gray again. That last medium gray part comprises the bulk of the background color and I want deleted. That halo of light gray allows me to use the magic wand tool and after inverting select the innermost black text with its medium gray skin. That medium gray skin is what I am trying to darken.
When my new photoshop layer is created consisting of the medium gray skin I can’t do anything with it. Therein lies the problem. Photoshop will not adjust levels, contrast, or even replace the colors. It is like they don’t exist, even though I know they are there.
I have attached a sample tiff image of a portion of the layer in question. Even opening up this new image Photoshop just won’t do anything with it. Don’t ask me why it is so big even though there is almost nothing there, I have no idea. The second version of the tiff is after I ran it through ThumbsPlus by replacing the color range. This is what I want Photoshop to do.
I don’t want to have to export the layer as a separate image, edit it in another software program, reimport the image as a new layer, and integrate it with the original. I must be missing how to do this because I thought Photoshop could do it all. Incidentally, I noticed Photoshop does darken the first sample tif, but that is after I made the crop in ThumbsPlus and saved it s a compressed tif. The original exported layer that I made the crop from does not work in Photoshop even after saving it as a tiff. I can supply the original if someone wants to take a look.
The problem I am trying to address is the degradation of the outermost portion of the letters. In an extreme closeup the letters actually look like a dark skeleton, surrounded by a medium gray, surrounded by a very light gray, surrounded by medium gray again. That last medium gray part comprises the bulk of the background color and I want deleted. That halo of light gray allows me to use the magic wand tool and after inverting select the innermost black text with its medium gray skin. That medium gray skin is what I am trying to darken.
When my new photoshop layer is created consisting of the medium gray skin I can’t do anything with it. Therein lies the problem. Photoshop will not adjust levels, contrast, or even replace the colors. It is like they don’t exist, even though I know they are there.
I have attached a sample tiff image of a portion of the layer in question. Even opening up this new image Photoshop just won’t do anything with it. Don’t ask me why it is so big even though there is almost nothing there, I have no idea. The second version of the tiff is after I ran it through ThumbsPlus by replacing the color range. This is what I want Photoshop to do.
I don’t want to have to export the layer as a separate image, edit it in another software program, reimport the image as a new layer, and integrate it with the original. I must be missing how to do this because I thought Photoshop could do it all. Incidentally, I noticed Photoshop does darken the first sample tif, but that is after I made the crop in ThumbsPlus and saved it s a compressed tif. The original exported layer that I made the crop from does not work in Photoshop even after saving it as a tiff. I can supply the original if someone wants to take a look.