Bitmap help

[Jeffo]

Hello GP! I lurk and learn from this inspiring forum. I'm having bit map issues and thought I would ask here(hopefully right section). Could someone please tell me the best steps in photoshop to get an image like this into bitmap for printing on a poster? I've tried different lpi and angle and none of it seems to look like what I want. The darks end up being too scattered instead of remaining totally black where they should be. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance!

[Jeffo]

This is the look I'm trying to get...

[vastagh]

go premium and all shall be answered.

until then, wait for Steve to ask you what your favorite cheese is...

[standard]

Instead of directly answering your question, I will merely state the obvious:

1. If you want parts of the photo darker, make them darker.
2. If you want parts of the photo brighter and more blown-out, do that too.
3. Combine the best bits of both.

You're looking for a one-click solution, and then you're not happy with the results. It's because it requires more than one step. It requires patience and experimentation and process.

[Steph Nitro]

try adjusting the light/dark levels in the curves option while your image is still a greyscale, then convert to bitmap of choice. as standard points out, it'll probably be a matter of repeating it over and over until you like what you get.

[Jeffo]

Thanks guys. I actually thought of that after asking here. I was looking at the photo thinking "well, what's the obvious solution here?". What I did was select the black at about 50% so I got just the amount I wanted. Saved that selection as a layer to the side. Then I got a bitmap of the whole thing and used that as an underlayer. When I pasted the un-bitmapped black layer over it it gave me exactly what I was looking for.

[hypo]

I loath the "go premium" and someone will answer you shite. For example, I didn't re-up my premium membership because I have issues with some of PayPal's practices. Plus (as it's been stated), just being on this site is helping support it.

[edwardo_machino]

I would have suggested combining the halftone output with a threshold to flesh out the blacks.