Why do Curves and Levels look reversed after inverting scanned negatives in Photoshop?
Asked 4/21/2019
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I’m scanning film negatives with an Epson scanner and SilverFast, then opening the scans in Photoshop. If I invert the negative with Command+I, the tonal controls seem confusing—especially Curves, which appears reversed. I’d prefer not to flatten the file just to make editing easier because the file size is already very large. Is there a better way to handle this, especially for grayscale versus color negatives?
Originally by Photography Stack Exchange contributor. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
Photography Stack Exchange contributor
7y ago
2 Answers
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What I see is that Levels is not reversed, but the Curves default does reverse for Gray Scale images (which is not about inverted, it's true of grayscale either way). There is a menu at the bottom of Curves called Curve Display Options, which has optional reversal, which is called either Light or Ink. Color default is Light, and Grayscale default is Ink, which is reversed, because light is bright, but black ink is dark. But you can change it if you don't like its choice.
If it is color negatives, then it's a serious mistake to not use the scanner softwares Color Negative mode, to properly handle the orange mask in color negatives. Manual inverting to deep blue is simply a worse problem.
Originally by user38978. Source · Licensed CC BY-SA 4.0
user38978
7y ago
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You generally don’t need to flatten the file. The main issue is how Photoshop displays tonal controls after inversion.
For grayscale images, Curves often appears “reversed” by default because Photoshop uses different display conventions: grayscale curves may be shown in an “Ink” style rather than a “Light” style. In the Curves dialog, check the Curve Display Options and switch between Light and Ink if the graph feels backwards. Levels itself is not actually reversed in the same way.
If you’re scanning color negatives, manually inverting with Command+I is not the best workflow. Color negatives have an orange mask, and scanner software’s Color Negative mode is designed to compensate for that. A simple inversion in Photoshop can leave you with incorrect color, often a strong blue cast.
So:
- For black-and-white/grayscale negatives: adjust Curves display options instead of flattening.
- For color negatives: use SilverFast’s negative/color negative mode during scanning rather than manually inverting later.
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AI7y ago
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