Curves?

[someone]

Hey everybody. This is a question I've been wondering about for a long time now, but have never asked:

Can somebody tell me what the curves in "curves" mean? I mean... there's the little graph with the line that goes from the bottom left corner up to the top right corner, and that's all I know. I have no idea what the graph means, what what the opposite corners represent or whatever etc. halp!? :eek::p

[scientuslatens]

I was going to attempt to condense the answer as much as possible, but for the sake of brevity, this person does an excellent job of explaining all you would want to know about the Curves tool. http://www.cambridgeincolour.com/tutorials/photoshop-curves.htm

Again moving from left to right, you have shadows, midtones, and highlights, with the left point being your black point and the right being your white point. Moving certain parts of the line will either boost or mute certain ranges of the spectrum. Hit the jump for more info ;)

The curves most like has to do with convolution of the base contrast curve, with the histogram being convoluted "through" the manipulated curve after the adjustment is applied.

[someone]

thanks for the link! I'll check it out