Adobe After Effects CS3 - Manual (Page 103)

AFTER EFFECTS CS3
User Guide
98
Brightness Adjusts the brightness or darkness of the image, much as the Exposure property does. However, instead
of clipping the image in the highlights or shadows, Brightness compresses the highlights and expands the shadows
when you move the slider to the right. Often, the best way to use this control is to set the overall tonal scale by first
setting Exposure, Recovery, and Blacks; then set Brightness. Large Brightness adjustments can affect shadow or
highlight clipping, so you may want to readjust the Exposure, Recovery, or Blacks property after adjusting
Brightness.
Contrast Increases or decreases image contrast, mainly affecting midtones. When you increase contrast, the middle-
to-dark image areas become darker, and the middle-to-light image areas become lighter. Generally, you use the
Contrast property to adjust the contrast of the midtones after setting the Exposure, Blacks, and Brightness values.
Fine-tune tone curves in Camera Raw
Use tone curves to fine-tune images after you’ve made tone adjustments in the Basic tab.The tone curves represent
changes made to the tonal scale of an image. The horizontal axis represents the original tone values of the image
(input values), with black on the left and progressively lighter values toward the right. The vertical axis represents
the changed tone values (output values), with black on the bottom and progressing to white at the top.
If a point on the curve moves up, the output is a lighter tone; if it moves down, the output is a darker tone. A straight,
45-degree line indicates no changes to the tone response curve: the original input values exactly match the output
values.
Use the tone curve in the Parametric tab to adjust the values in specific tonal ranges in the image. The areas of the
curve affected by the region properties (Highlights, Lights, Darks, or Shadows) depend on where you set the split
controls at the bottom of the graph. The middle region properties (Darks and Lights) mostly affect the middle region
of the curve. The Highlight and Shadows properties mostly affect the ends of the tonal range.
❖ To adjust tone curves, do any of the following:
• Drag the Highlights, Lights, Darks, or Shadows slider in the Parametric tab. You can expand or contract the curve
regions that the sliders affect by dragging the region divider controls along the horizontal axis of the graph.
• Drag a point on the curve in the Point tab. As you drag the point, the Input and Output tonal values are displayed
beneath the tone curve.
• Choose an option from the Curve menu in the Point tab. The setting you choose is reflected in the Point tab, but
not in the settings in the Parametric tab. Medium Contrast is the default setting.
Clarity, Saturation, and Vibrance controls in Camera Raw
You can change the color saturation (vividness or color purity) of all colors by adjusting the Clarity, Vibrance, and
Saturation controls on the Basic tab. (To adjust saturation for a specific range of colors, use the controls on the HSL
/ Grayscale tab.)
Clarity Adds depth to an image by increasing local contrast. This setting is similar to a large-radius unsharp mask.
When using this setting, it is best to zoom in to 100% or greater. To maximize the effect, increase the setting until
you see halos near the edge details of the image and then reduce the setting slightly.
Vibrance Adjusts the saturation so that clipping is minimized as colors approach full saturation, changing the
saturation of all lower-saturated colors with less effect on the higher-saturated colors. Vibrance also prevents skin
tones from becoming oversaturated.
Saturation Adjusts the saturation of all image colors equally from -100 (monochrome) to +100 (double the
saturation).