A simplified value scale in contour fashion using Adobe Photoshop
I use Photoshop 7. Open image. Next go to
Image>Adjust>Auto Levels. Do this to all images that you open - from
a camera, from the scanner or from the web.
Now go to Image>Adjust>Posterize.
Chose the levels (basically the number of
values) you want - experiment. Lower numbers mean less areas of value and
will be higher contrast whereas high numbers will have less contrast.