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Use your digital technology to fix a common photo problem: underexposure and overexposure.

Unfortunately, the sun can play tricks on a camera’s light meter (which reads the light coming in and selects the correct—or incorrect—settings accordingly). This can produce photos that are underexposed, meaning not enough light was entering the camera and the photo is too dark. When too much light comes into the camera, the photo is overexposed, and the result is a very bright, light print with loss of detail. These images suffer a loss of quality with certain types of digital corrections. For instance, if you use the Levels or Curves tools when correcting, the poorly exposed image becomes grainy. To get better results, do the following:

1. In Photoshop, a toolbox at the bottom right corner has a tab labeled Layers. Below the tab is a thumbnail of your photo with the label Background next to it. Right-click on Background, and select Duplicate Layer. This creates a duplicate of your photo.

2. Making sure that the duplicate layer is selected, click on the drop-down menu that is directly below the Layers tab. The default selection is Normal. Change that to Screen. This lightens the image without any resulting noise or grain.

3. If the image is still not light enough, create a duplicate of your top layer (not the background). Since you’re duplicating the screened layer, the new layer will already have the screen option selected, and you can lighten it even more. Continue doing this until you are happy with the results.

If your image is overexposed, follow the same steps as above, but instead of selecting Screen choose Multiply.

HELPFUL HINT: If the Screen or Multiply layer is too light or dark, change the number in the Opacity box. By clicking on the arrow next to the box, you can adjust the amount and see what works best.