Have you ever taken a photo that ends up very dark or the highlights are too strong while shadows are too dark? Shadow/Highlights was introduced with the CS version of Photoshop. This allows improved control over dark (shadow) and light (highlight) areas of images. When used in combination with other tools, you can transform photos to be better balanced and possibly spectacular.

This tool performs complex image manipulations under the hood and provides you with a simple front end for accomplishing intended tasks quickly.

Shadow/Highlight can find and accentuate images. But in images that are too overexposed, detail can be permanently lost. To a lesser degree, the same goes for images that are too underexposed. Even with difficult images, Shadow/Highlight provides tools for finessing the data out of your image.

Use of this tool without a fundamental understanding of settings can cause unwanted effects in images that may go unnoticed upon initial inspection. Common to improper use are halos and color shifts. Colors shifts and blurring are also a possibility with improper application of the Shadow/Highlight tool. Review final results carefully.

Quick Start Instructions for Shadow/Highlights

More detailed instructions are available below.

Start the Shadow/Highlight Tool

Photoshop:  Image > Adjustments > Shadow/Highlights

1. Open an image in need of repair and choose Shadow/Highlights.
2. Move the Amount slider - adjust amount of correction for Shadows and/or Highlights.
3. If happy with results, click OK. If you want more control, click the Show More Options check box.
4. Drag Tonal Width slider to increase or decrease the range of tones adjusted.
5. Drag Radius slider to increase or decrease the number of pixels. If you find midtones and highlights getting too light, reduce Tonal Width percent of Shadows.
6. Make additional changes in Adjustments area as needed

Photoshop Elements 3.0: Enhance > Adjust Lighting > Shadows/Highlights

1. Open an image in need of repair and choose Shadow/Highlights.
2. Move the Amount slider to adjust the amount of correction for Shadows and/or Highlights

Detailed Shadow/Highlights Tutorial

Launch the Shadow/Highlights Tool

Photoshop Elements 3.0: Enhance > Adjust Lighting > Shadows/Highlights

Elements offers shadow and highlights basic adjustments, but does not provide the capability to fine-tune these controls.

Photoshop: Image > Adjustments > Shadow/Highlights

This is the Photoshop Dialogue Box with "Show All Options" shown. The settings shown are the default settings for the various sliders. The original straight out of the camera image we will work with is shown below (no adjustments).

When you open the tool, default settings will be used and your images potentially will change dramatically if the "preview" button is checked. That applies the current settings (shown below). The defaults are appropriate for a only few images. You need to know how to make the adjustments for each image to obtain optimal results.

The Shadow/Highlight tool has sliders for shadows, and highlights. The shadows slider lightens dark areas of images, the highlights slider darkens the highlight areas.

Check "Show more options" as it reveals additional settings. These advanced settings allow absolute control. For each of the Amount sliders there are options, "Tonal Width" and "Radius".

The "Tonal Width" slider adjusts the pixel value range are to be included in the adjustment. A low Tonal Width value set for shadows includes only the darkest of pixels that you can adjust. A low Tonal Width value for highlights includes the brightest pixels for adjustment. Adjusting these sliders toward the right (raising the tonal width value) will add to the range of pixels adjusted.

The "Radius" slider adjusts the neighborhood of pixels affected by adjustments - this is different from Tonal Width as it determines by relative location rather than luminosity (or brightness/darkness).

When adjusting images some find it best to follow these steps:

Start with Levels, adjust the image carefully while keeping in mind there will be additional adjustments to dark and/or light areas.

Open the Shadow/Highlight tool Image > Adjustments > Shadow/Highlight. Verify the "Show more options" button is checked and place zeros in both Amount sliders and in Tonal Width sliders.

Verify both Radius amounts are set to roughly 50-100 pixels. This varies depending upon the image size, but is a good place to start - for a 6-8 megapixel image. If you notice a blurring effect (or loss of detail) this indicates the radius not set correctly. You can select to "Save as defaults" if you only want to enter these settings once.

Start with either shadows or highlights Amount. We will start with shadows.

Slide the Shadow Amount slider to the right and note changes in your image (be sure the preview option is checked). Since Tonal Width is set to "0" (all the way to the left), you will notice that the deepest of shadows are affected.

With images devoid of deep shadows, there may be little or no effect. Adjust the slider so dark shadows begin to look OK. If unsure where to stop, or see no changes, start at 50% and adjust from there.

Adjust Tonal Width to the right and note additional areas that are affected. Be wary of change in areas that you don't want affected (the mid-tones). Contrast can be lost. Once the effect is obvious, you can fine-tune with Amount and Tonal Width, using them together to achieve the desired results.

If you have a simple image with a subject and a clean, pleasing, middle-toned background, as in the example, it is best to not to adjust Tonal Width high enough to lighten (or darken) backgrounds - this can cause halos. While halos can be reduced with the Radius slider, it is at the expense of detail loss. If you want the background lighter or darker, do it using levels or curves the Shadow/Highlight tool. The most shadow detail is extracted by teetering the Tonal Width adjustment right to the edge of where it begins to effect the background - this is highly variable from one image to another! The same effect can be seen if you allow adjustment to affect the sky in landscape images.

When finished with Amount and Tonal Width, you should do final tweaking of the radius, ensuring you get the most detail. Simply slide the radius one way or the other from your starting point and review the image details. Experimentation is almost always necessary as images vary. If blurring effect and loss of detail is observed this indicates the radius is too low.

Once satisfied with shadow adjustments, move to highlights adjustments repeating the same steps using Amount, Tonal Width and Radius sliders.

Slide the Highlight Amount slider to the right and note image changes. Since the Tonal width slider is at "0" (all the way to the left), note that only the brightest of highlights are affected, and with some images, there may be little or no effect. Adjust the slider so the bright highlights in your image look satisfactory. If you are unsure where to stop, or see no effect, then start at 50%.

Adjust Tonal Width to the right and note the new areas affected. Once you start to see the effect, you can fine tune each of the Amount and Tonal Width sliders, using them together to achieve the effect.

Once happy with Amount and Tonal Width adjustments you should do final tweaking of the radius ensuring you get the most image details.

Other Adjustments

Color Correction

Adjusts for loss of saturation in the adjusted areas in the image. This is a way to add saturation back in these areas without affecting other areas. Generally leave this set to 20% for a mild correction. The effects are generally mild, some color benefit can be gained.

Mid-tone Contrast

Images with little tonal range in mid-tones and dark areas can benefit from mid-tone adjustment.. This adds contrast to the mid-tones, brings up dark shadows and reduces washed-out looks. Leave this at zero unless lightening an image with severely underexposed areas and need to bring back some contrast to the lightened areas.

Black and White Clip settings

Set the amount of information adjustment may clip from the left and right ends of the histogram. Set both to 0.01 and rarely touch them.

Becoming adept with Shadow/Highlight opens images to new possibilities, perhaps even bringing old photos back to life.