Predicting Range of Acceptable Photographic Tonal Adjustments

There is often more than one way to select tonal adjustment-for a photograph, and different individuals may prefer different adjustments. However, selecting good adjustments is challenging. This paper describes a method to predict whether a given tonal rendition is acceptable for a photograph, which we use to characterize its range of acceptable adjustments. We gathered a dataset of image “acceptability” over brightness and contrast adjustments. We find that unacceptable renditions can be explained in terms of overexposure, under-exposure, and low contrast. Based on this observation, we propose a machine-learning algorithm to assess whether an adjusted photograph looks acceptable. We show that our algorithm can differentiate unsightly renditions from reasonable ones. Finally, we describe proof-of-concept applications that use our algorithm to guide the exploration of the possible tonal renditions of a photograph.