Closing Thoughts

Even though it's taken me a whole chapter to describe how to optimize your grayscale photos, keep in mind that the whole process takes about a minute once you're used to it. When you feel that you have mastered Levels, you will be ready to take on the ultimate adjustment tool—Curves. Curves is equipped to do the same basic corrections as Levels, but can also do much, much more. In general, with grayscale images I always start out using Levels, and then move on to Curves to fix any problems that Levels can't handle; I also use Curves to work with color. It's like graduating from a Ford Taurus to a Ferrari. The Ferrari takes more skill and coordination to master, but you get one hell of a ride. But that's another chapter.