Read and Understand Histogram
The histogram is a great tool in photography, which you should use as soon as you know the basics and the interaction of aperture, ISO and exposure time. The histogram and the light balance are great tools to see the brightness of an image on the camera while you are shooting. Learn easily and with concrete examples of how to interpret a histogram and benefit from it.
What is a histogram in photography?
With a histogram, you can evaluate, without looking at the image, how the tonal values such as brightness are distributed over the image. Afterward, the histogram can also be interpreted and the brightness values adjusted with graphics software such as Photoshop or Lightroom.
Meaning of the Values
What does this “mountain landscape” mean? The histogram can be divided into three parts – the depths, the midtones and the highlights. The depths correspond to the dark areas in an image, so the highlights correspond to the light areas. The mid-tones in the middle of the histogram make up the largest area.
© JogyOn the X-axis, i.e. from left to right on the horizontal, thetonal range is displayed from completely black to completely white. The Y-axis, i.e. the vertical axis, shows the frequency of a certain tonal value or tone value. Level of brightness. So the higher a “mountain”, the more often the corresponding tone value occurs. This may seem a little complicated at first. But if you know what kind of information you get with it, then it is worthwhile to read on here.
Using the Histogram
Even while taking a picture, the histogram can be used to show the brightness distribution for an image directly on the camera display. This is very useful to get a quick impression of the brightness and contrast in the image. As can be seen in the picture below, a histogram shows mountainous areas that look different depending on the camera settings and, of course, the subject and lighting conditions.
Identifying the Contrast
If there is a large mountain in the mid-tones on the histogram and little to no curves on the left and right sides, this strongly indicates that there is too little contrast in the image. It simply lacks the highs and lows, with which details it becomes visible through the contrast.
Interpret colors in the histogram
Just like for the brightness, there is also a histogram for the color channels red, green and blue, with which the colors can be evaluated separately. It is then clearly visible how much red, blue and green are present.
