Video tutorial is done!https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4mPG5L7rT4Q[LINK UPDATED BY STAFF]I've made some modifications to the tutorial and added a few more ways to improve the image quality.
I'm re-posting the entire tutorial so there is no more confusion.Syl3ntBob's Old Comics Editing TechniqueThis is about the third, fourth, maybe fifth time I've revised this technique. With time, comes a better understanding of a better ways to do things, i.e. trial and error. So here we go again-
Scanning: Try to scan the page in a tiff format, much more info than a jpeg. If you're constrained by the lack of hard disk space then a high quality jpeg is fine. As usual scanning at 400 d.p.i.
Always use a black or dark color piece of paper behind the page to lessen the bleed-thru, although there is still going to be some.
I've tried to lessen the bleed-thru and the yellowing of pages by setting the color mode in Vuescan to Auto Levels, but in the end it didn't work well in the long run, especially if one of the panels had a lite yellow. So I used the color option of None. (Note: In Vuescan on the advanced filters tab everything is unchecked, Grain Reduction is set to Heavy.)
Now to the meat and potatoes.
1. Open your scan in Photoshop and straighten and crop the image.
2. Bring up the Curves (Image>Adjustments>Curves) and on the right side of the panel click Options. Then mark the tic Find Dark & Light Colors under Algorithms.
b. Check Snap Neutral Midtones
c. Under the Target Colors & Clipping: Set the both the Clip boxes to 3%
Click OK twice on each of the dialogue boxes.
3. Duplicate the layer twice. (The layer should be flattened and called Background. All together you should have 3 layers. Background, Background copy, Background copy 2)
4. Select layer Background copy
5. Apply a Gaussian Blur of 1.0 (Filter>Blur> Gaussian Blur)
6. Select layer Background copy 2
7. Next go to Image>Apply image (Frequency Separation)
a. In The Apply Image Menu, from the Select Layer Drop-Down menu > Select Layer Background copy
Check Invert
Under the Blending Drop-Down menu, Select Add
Opacity 100%
Scale: 2
Offset: 0
Click Okay
8. Change Background copy 2 from Normal to Linear Light and hide the layer by clicking the 'eye' to the left of the layer.
9. Delete the layer Background copy
10. Duplicate the layer Background.
11. Select Background copy and use a Noiseware setting of Strong. (Filter>Imagenomic>Noiseware)
12. Apply a Surface Blur of 100/10 (Filter>Blur>Surface Blur)
13. Create an Adjustment Levels layer (Layer>New Adjustment Layer>Levels)
a. Leveling the Blacks: Try to find a neutral area away from any other colors around the center of the page.
b. Leveling the Whites: Same thing as the blacks, try not to over brighten.
14. Set the Opacity of the Background copy layer to 50%
15. Select the Background layer
16. Apply an Unsharp Mask of 100% - 0.9 - 0 (Filter>Sharpen>Unsharp Mask)
17. Merge Visible (Background copy 2 should still be hidden)
18. Duplicate Background Layer
19. Select Background Layer Copy
20. Surface Blur 20/20 at 50% Opacity
21. Merge Visible
22. Unhide Background copy 2 (clicking the 'eye' to the left of the layer)
23. Duplicate the Background layer (Background copy layer should be selected)
24. Apply a Curves Adjustment layer (Layer>New Adjustment Layer>Curves)
a. Under the Presets: Select Curves Vibrancy
b. At the bottom left of the curves dialogue box press the clipping option, to just affect the Background copy layer.
c. Change the Curves layer from Normal to Multiply, with a 50% Opacity.
25. Merge Visible.
26. Run the Action Lab Color (Provided below in the zip file)
27. Set the Lab Color Opacity to 50%
28. Merge Visible.
29. Unsharp Mask 80%/.8/0
30. Duplicate Layer
31. Set Layer from Normal to Soft Light at 50% opacity.
32. Flatten.
At this point overlook the whole page and see if the anything needs to be adjusted with the levels or colors. If so re-do the levels until you're satisfied with the look of the image.
Apply the appropriate canvas size. For the X-Titles I've been using 6.625(w) x 10.125(h), with an Offset of -50.
After Image AdjustmentsMost of the time there will still be some yellowing in the whites with brown flecks from the pulp paper. Large black areas will have speckled bits of color in them.
To remedy some of this I use Selective Color, Curves and a soft light layer with despeckle (which I'll explain later).
Selective color settings: (Image>Adjustments>Selective Color)
From the Colors: drop down menu select Whites
a. Yellows 50%
b. Blacks 50%
From the Colors: drop down menu select Blacks
a. Blacks 5%
Next I bring up the Curves and bring the left slider (Black) over to 10, or to a spot that looks appropriate. With the right slider I bring it over to the midway start of the peak, so that the whites are pronounced more.
At this point I start on cleaning up the gutters, text and the whole of the image.
For the gutters, use the magic wand tool with these settings: Sample size: 5x5, Tolerance: 25, Anti-alias and Contiguous checked. Select the gutters area where needed getting all the bits that are around the panels to make them white with the fill option.
I use an action with these settings: Select>Refine Edge > Smooth: 1 Shift Edge: -5%. Got to Edit> and under Use: Select Foreground color (white). Under Blending: Normal with 100% opacity, click OK, and deselect. Clean up any remaining specks with the brush tool.
Text clean-upFor balloons I select them with the Quick Selection Tool and apply these settings:
Bring up the Shadows/ Highlights dialogue box (Image>Adjustments>Shadows/Highlights)
In the Shadows area:
Amount: 50%
Tonal Width: 50%
Radius: 50px
In the Highlights area:
Amount: 50%
Tonal Width: 100%
Radius: 50px
Under Adjustments both are 0
Black and White clip are at 0.01%
Refine Edge Smooth: 1, Shift Edge +5%
Desaturate
Levels at 30/.75/150
Blur (Filter>Blur>Blur)
Fill (Edit>Fill) with Use: Foreground Color (should be white, if not select outside of box) Blending: Color
Fill (Edit>Fill) with Use: Foreground Color (should be white, if not select outside of box) Blending: Darken
Deselect
The Fills used in that process are for other colors other than white, mostly for yellow text boxes. And to clean the text even more if needed run the process again.
CleaningGo over any areas of black and white with the brush tool, choosing the appropriate color. The Fill Tool can be used on enclosed white areas. Try to get the settings on the Fill Tool half way decent so as not to damage the lines surrounding where you fill. I use Opacity 50%, Tolerance: 25, with Anti-alias and Contiguous checked.
The Spot Healing Brush and the Healing Brush Tool can pretty much work miracles from this point on. From the previous way I edited the X-titles cleaning with these tools now is much easier and faster.
With the Spot Healing Brush Tool go over any area that needs cleaning using Mode: Replace and Content-Aware ticked as the settings in the tool options.
If there are printing smudges, or just a large dirty area that Spot Healing Brush can't handle use the Healing Brush Tool, with these settings: Mode: Replace and Source: Sampled ticked. With these settings use it just like you would the Clone Tool. Selecting the spot you want and replace over the affected area. When using this method you can go right up and just along a line and it will not damage said line.
After everything is clean there still might be some miniscule white specks in the blacks. Which I mentioned at the start of After Image Adjustments.
White Speck Removal in Blacks 1. Duplicate the Background layer
2. Change the Background copy layer from Normal to Soft Light.
3. Despeckle (Filter>Noise>Despeckle)
4. Change Opacity of Background copy layer to 50-75%
5. Merge Visible.
Black & Flat Color Clean-upHere's another way to clean up the Blacks! Yay another one! ughhh!
Modified technique from here:
[DEAD LINK REMOVED BY STAFF]And it begins...
01. Duplicate the layer
02. Apply a heavy setting in Noiseware
03. Apply a Surface Blur of 50/50
04. Make a Levels adjustment layer (darken lighten as much as you want)
05. Create a clipping mask to duplicated layer
06. Merge Layers
07. Apply a Blur
08. Create a Snapshot (press the little camera at the bottom of the history pane)
09. Check to the left of the Snapshot for the history brush source.
10. Then go back several steps in the history pane to where the duplicate layer was created and select that history state.
Once that is done, select the History Brush tool and clean up any areas in the blacks that need it.
Be careful around some lines and color areas. The smoothing of the Surface Blur will take surrounding color and mix everything together. So be expected to run into that sort of thing.
This can also be used in the white areas and some of the flat color areas (reds, yellows, and lighter colors. Blues and greens tend to come out darker)
Black Fill Clean-up using Lab Color Mode.As you know, I've been struggling to find a way to fill in the blacks on these older Marvel books. Most of the previous incarnations of cleaning the blacks I've tried involve using some sort of fill, but mostly the brush tool or history tool has been used.
This technique, which I'm going to try and explain in the simplest form, that I've taken bits from here
[DEAD LINK REMOVED BY STAFF]is going to help considerably in an effort to fill in the broken areas of ink in the image. Be it from faded inks from printing, color overlay, or some hollow lines.
What this essentially does is make an inked page, which you can edit without the fear of running into the color portions of the image. A clean palette in a manner of speaking.
And it begins again. (For the final time, who knows?)
Part 1
1. Duplicate your image layer that you're working on.
2. Right click on the duplicated layer and duplicate the layer again, but this time from the drop down Destination menu select New.
3. Go to Image>Mode>Lab Color and covert the layer to Lab Color.
4. Navigate to the Channels panel and select the Lightness channel.
5. Delete the a & b channels. (Once a or b is deleted you'll be asked to flatten, click OK. One of the channels will be renamed to Alpha 2, which is the a or b channel, delete it.)
6. Next, convert the image to Grayscale. Image>Mode>Grayscale
7. Convert the image again, this time to RGB Color. Image>Mode>RGB Color (This way you can work on the image in a normal fashion.)
8. Now go to Image>Adjustments>Threshold...
Once adjustment box is up, drag the slider all the way to the left and gradually bring the slider to the right to a spot that doesn't darken the smaller finer areas. Once that is done click OK.
At this point darken in any areas that need it. Refer back to your original image to see what areas might be affected.
Part 2
Now that's complete, you're going to transfer this B&W image into your original image.
1. Select>All and Copy.
2. Go back to your original image and select Background copy.
3. Add a Layer Mask. Layer>Layer Mask>Reveal All.
4. Alt Click onto the Layer Mask and paste the B&W image into the mask.
5. Invert the image using Ctrl+i or Image>Adjustments>Invert.
6. Click the Background copy layer to exit the mask.
7. Change the Blending mode in the Layers panel from Normal to Multiply.
8. Deselect the image. Select>Deselect.
9. Right click on the Layer Mask in Background copy and click "Add Mask To Selection".
10. Click onto the Background copy layer thumbnail. **This way you don't fill in the mask layer.**
11. Now that the masked selection is on the right part of the layer go to Edit>Fill and select Black anywhere on the page or reset your swatches in the tools panel beforehand. Click OK.
12. Deselect and Flatten image.
White Gutter Clean-up using Lab ColorPart 1
1. Duplicate your image layer that you're working on.
2. Right click on the duplicated layer and duplicate the layer again, but this time from the drop down Destination menu select New.
3. Go to Image>Mode>Lab Color and covert the layer to Lab Color.
4. Navigate to the Channels panel and select the Lightness channel.
5. Delete the a & b channels. (Once a or b is deleted you'll be asked to flatten, click OK. One of the channels will be renamed to Alpha 2, which is the a or b channel, delete it.)
6. Next, convert the image to Grayscale. Image>Mode>Grayscale
7. Convert the image again, this time to RGB Color. Image>Mode>RGB Color (This way you can work on the image in a normal fashion.)
8. Now go to Image>Adjustments>Threshold...
In the Black Fill clean-up I said to move the slider all the way to the left. But on that setting it doesn't keep the borders intact due to the low threshold and finer inking.
All you need to do is make the borders of the panels fully solid and intact. The midway point (default 128) or higher might suffice, depending on the image.
If there are any remnants left in the gutters you can edit them here, for a better selection or clean them when the process is over.
Part 2
Now that's complete, you're going to transfer this B&W image into your original image.
1. Select>All and Copy.
2. Go back to your original image and select Background copy.
3. Add a Layer Mask. Layer>Layer Mask>Reveal All.
4. Alt Click onto the Layer Mask and paste the B&W image into the mask.
5. Deselect the image. Select>Deselect.
6. Now select the gutters using the Magic Wand Tool, making sure Contiguous is checked.
7. Click onto the Background copy layer thumbnail. **This way you don't fill in the mask layer.**
8. Now that the masked selection is on the right part of the layer go to Edit>Fill and select the appropriate color. Click OK.
9. Deselect and Flatten image.
Now you have clean solid color borders and gutters.
Here is the zip file of the tutorial and actions. Its contents are the tutorial, all the actions in the video, Curve and Noiseware presets.Syl3ntBob's Old Comics Editing Technique - Tutorial & Actions.zip (37 KB)
[b][DEAD LINK REMOVED BY STAFF][/b]
Thanks for everything Zog!
