Burn and Dodge tools not working on b/w sketch scan

Hi, I may have somehow eliminated information in an image of a black and white sketch which prevents the dodge and burn tools from working...is there a common mistake which prevents these tools from working as they normally should on a black and white image with multiple shades? (The sketch is not pure black and pure white but has multiple gray shades...it "looks" like an image on which these tools should work.)

When adjusting Levels for the image all of its "information" seems to be clustered around the "0" point on the far left of the Levels adjustment slider, if that helps in understanding this problem....

Did I mistakenly somewhere along the line destroy information in this image necessary for these tools to work?

Thanks in advance

Shades of grey should definitely be affected by burn and dodge. You're working on the actual pixel'ed layer and not an adjustment layer, right?

all of its "information" seems to be clustered around the "0" point on the far left ...

That would indicate a very dark or black image. Can you post a screen shot?

thanks for your help...after hitting "Auto" in the Layers panel information seems to be spread across the entire 0 to 255 spectrum, but, still remains unaffected by burn and dodge tools. It is just a regular grayscale sketch, not terribly dark (posting an image is very difficult where I am now).

Also tested the burn and dodge tools on other images...their settings and such work fine with those images but not this b/w sketch.

Thank you

Are you set up for RGB or Grayscale or something else?

What is your setting under Image/Mode

RGB, 8 bits per channel

I can send a simplified version of the file (single layer 1.4 MB) to anyone interested in trying to replicated the problem...

thanks again...sorry I cannot be more descriptive of the settings and such I am using but they all seem to be tool defaults

probably something simple though I just screwed up : )

here's the .psd file (called "test")

< http://cid-cfbe994975ba077c.skydrive.live.com/browse.aspx/.P ublic?uc=1>

thanks for your help

"Windows Live" ??? You're not using Windows, are you?

Could not use the file you uploaded. Sorry. Didn't work for me.

hmmm...I downloaded and opened the file without a problem...?

this is just a free file sharing feature associated with an old hotmail account, not using windows...but rather than being a Mac evangelist at this moment were you unable to download the file, also? Is there another free file sharing server you would prefer? I can't up it to our company website now...sorry about these issues....

thanks again

I try to right click and Save Link As and it allows me to save the test.psd but it is only 39.7 kb which is not the file.

If I click on the file, it only reloads the page with no Save/Open dialog box.

?

Hey, Ramón didn't say Windoze! :)

I downloaded the file and your problem is that the sketch is partially transparent. (turn off the white layer and you can see checkerboard through it) I could get Burn and Dodge to affect it a little with 100% exposure, but as is, you're not going to get much with the transparency. If you duplicate the layer a few times and flatten it, burn and dodge will have more of an affect, but of course, the sketch is much darker.

rq - don't save link - just click and it will download.

-phil

Scratch the advice to duplicate the layer - just flatten the file over the white background and burn and dodge will work fine.

Ok I'm using BergDesign PeelOff White to strip a drawing from its scanned white paper backround, so, I will need to burn and dodge and so on before placing the isolating the sketch on a transparent layer? I guess burn and dodge doesn't work on partially transparent pixels? Hmmm...shoot...that's a disappointment...do you know of a better way to lift a pencil sketch off its white paper background?

It is possible to flatten these peeled off sketches onto white backgrounds at any point, then burn and so on, and then peel the results off again, but, it would be nice I guess if dodge and burn worked on partially transparent images. I guess you are saying this is impossible?

Thanks very much -- all of you -- for your help. Really appreciate it.

rewrite...(there's a lot going on here...that previous post didn't make much sense):

I'm using BergDesign PeelOff White to strip a drawing from its scanned white paper backround. I will need to burn and dodge before peeling off the sketch to a transparent layer?

Burn and dodge doesn't work on partially transparent pixels?

Do you know of a better way to lift a pencil sketch off its white paper background, other than Peel Off White?

It is possible to flatten/merge these peeled off sketches onto white backgrounds at any point during the workflow, then burn, then peel the results off again, but, it would be nice if dodge and burn worked on partially transparent images. This is impossible?

Hope that is better, thanks again.....

Just click will not work in Firefox but did as it turns out in Safari.

Hok.

Jezz, do all your adjustments before using Peel off White.

it would be nice if dodge and burn worked on partially transparent images. This is impossible?

It is working properly. With a partially transparent layered image, only **some** of the visible tone is coming from the image layer. The rest is coming from whatever is showing on the layer underneath. Burn and dodge will only affect the layer you're working on. As I said, I could get get B&D to affect it a little ... and that's is exactly what it should do in this case. Because the pixels are partially transparent, B&D is only going to **partially** affect the visible tone. It's altering the pixels on the image layer, just not very much because there aren't very many pixels available.

Peel off white does an incredible job. However, I would use it only once. The fact that the sketch becomes a bit transparent tells you it's removing image information.