The Digital Negative
With this in mind, it is vitally important that we set the highlights correctly.
If the highlights are clipped too much, we risk losing important highlight detail.
And if we do not clip them enough, we end up with a print lacking impact.
A vital point to appreciate is the difference between reflective and non-reflective highlights. ( see fig 1 )
Fig 1, displays both - reflective and non-reflective highlight .
There is no detail in the white hat. Non-reflective highlight is present in the embroidery behind the seats.
A reflective highlight is a shiny highlight, such as the light reflected by a glass or metal surface that contains no detail. These are the brightest part of the image.
Non-reflective highlights need to be treated more carefully, because they mostly contain important detail that needs to be preserved.
Looking at the histogram check that the non-reflective highlights are not clipped, cross over the right and side margin of the histogram.
Setting the Blacks
Setting the Blacks is not as critical as when adjusting for the highlights.
It really depends on how much you want to clip the shadows.
With some images the objective is to clip the blacks just a little so as to maximize the tonal range between the shadows and the highlights. Some photographs may contain important information in the shadows. Fig 3, is a good example of shadow detail that needs to be preserved.
It is rarely a good idea to clip the highlights unnecessarily, but clipping the shadows can greatly enhance the contrast. ( see Fig 4 )
In the end how much to clip the shadows will depends on the photographer's taste.
