Adjust levels when an image looks flat, washed out, too dark, or low contrast. Levels uses three controls: black point, white point, and midtone gamma.
Read the histogram
The histogram shows where brightness values sit from 0 to 255.
- left side: shadows and blacks
- middle: midtones
- right side: highlights and whites
If most values sit in the middle, the image may look flat. If values are crowded on the left, the image is dark. If values are crowded on the right, highlights may already be close to clipping.
Black point and white point
Black point sets which input value becomes black. Moving it right deepens shadows and increases contrast, but pushing it too far crushes detail in hair, fabric, dark products, and night scenes.
White point sets which input value becomes white. Moving it left brightens highlights and increases contrast, but pushing it too far blows out skies, white clothing, labels, and reflections.
Move each point until the image gains contrast, then back off slightly if detail disappears.
Midtone gamma
Gamma changes the middle values without moving the black and white endpoints as strongly.
In this editor:
- lower gamma brightens midtones
1.00is neutral- higher gamma darkens midtones
Use gamma when faces, interiors, or product details need a lift but the highlights are already bright enough.
Auto Levels
Auto Levels is a starting point. It reads the luminance histogram and uses percentile endpoints instead of blindly forcing the darkest pixel to black and the brightest pixel to white. That avoids letting a tiny border, speck, or reflection control the whole correction.
After Auto, adjust black point, white point, and gamma by hand. A good auto result still may need a few points of correction for the actual subject.
Levels vs curves
Use Levels for broad exposure and contrast correction. Use Curves when a specific tonal range needs a custom shape, such as lifted shadows while highlights stay flat, or channel-specific color grading.
How levels are applied
Each channel value is normalized between the black and white points, clamped to 0-1, adjusted with gamma, and scaled back to 0-255. Alpha is preserved. Preview uses a capped size for responsiveness; download renders the original dimensions.