Adjust locally varying brightness

S
Posted By
samkut
Apr 1, 2007
Views
577
Replies
4
Status
Closed
Hi there

After some searching on the web, I have not found the solution to the following problem:

I have some photographic images of paper documents with text on it (due to size, it has to taken by camera). As the paper is old and a little faded by the light, the paper is whitish to brownish: the color and brightness is changing depending on the position (darker where the paper was hit by light). The text is dark grey, almost black.

Ideally, I would like to convert the images into pure black and white images (not greyscale: black text on white background).

Is there a good tutorial how to achieve this? The procedure has to account for the changing local brightness and contrast. (Using a simple threshold will render some parts of the image black or white; you cannot find a appropriate threshold for the whole image.)

Help is very much appreciated

sam

MacBook Pro 16” Mockups 🔥

– in 4 materials (clay versions included)

– 12 scenes

– 48 MacBook Pro 16″ mockups

– 6000 x 4500 px

G
granny
Apr 1, 2007
I have some photographic images of paper documents with text on it (due to size, it has to taken by camera). As the paper is old and a little faded by the light, the paper is whitish to brownish: the color and brightness is changing depending on the position (darker where the paper was hit by light). The text is dark grey, almost black.
Ideally, I would like to convert the images into pure black and white images (not greyscale: black text on white background).
sam

Sam,
you might try this:

converted to Lab Color then used Levels with the black and white point selectors (used black pointer on black and white pointer on the gray background areas).. while still in Lab Color used unsharp mask then converted back to RGB Color mode..

Also try:

Image/Adjustments/Replace Color (selecting the unwanted
colors) and adjusting the lightness and fuzziness to suit.. then using unsharp in Lab Color

"Granny"
G
GordonG
Apr 2, 2007
wrote:
Hi there

After some searching on the web, I have not found the solution to the following problem:

I have some photographic images of paper documents with text on it (due to size, it has to taken by camera). As the paper is old and a little faded by the light, the paper is whitish to brownish: the color and brightness is changing depending on the position (darker where the paper was hit by light). The text is dark grey, almost black.
Ideally, I would like to convert the images into pure black and white images (not greyscale: black text on white background).

Is there a good tutorial how to achieve this? The procedure has to account for the changing local brightness and contrast. (Using a simple threshold will render some parts of the image black or white; you cannot find a appropriate threshold for the whole image.)
Help is very much appreciated

sam

An option is to go to a company that prints house or building plans and ask them if they can scan the entire document for you… Then you can do what you like with it.

We do it here, but you may not want to make the journey to Australia 🙂

GG
S
samkut
Apr 2, 2007
here examples of the documents:

bw photograph:
http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=dc6sj683_2f97825

color photograph
http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=dc6sj683_4gbmgwj

Any help greatly appreciated. I am already playing with the hints that were posted. Thanks so far.

sam
T
Tacit
Apr 3, 2007
In article ,
wrote:

here examples of the documents:

bw photograph:
http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=dc6sj683_2f97825

color photograph
http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=dc6sj683_4gbmgwj

These images look like they can be fixed and converted to B&W very easily using the Levels and/or Curves command.


Photography, kink, polyamory, shareware, and more: all at http://www.xeromag.com/franklin.html

How to Improve Photoshop Performance

Learn how to optimize Photoshop for maximum speed, troubleshoot common issues, and keep your projects organized so that you can work faster than ever before!

Related Discussion Topics

Nice and short text about related topics in discussion sections