Re: Simple B&W Question

Your question isn't really simple. The outcome of photo or art depends on 
several things:
1. The original
2. Your scanner quality
3. How you scan it in
4. What you are doing with it in Photoshop

Any one of those things can make or break the final outcome.
1. If the original looks good, that is a good start.
2. If you have had good luck prior to this with your scanner, then you may be 
able to eliminate this as a possibility. 
3. Are you scanning it in grayscale or RGB? Try RGB if you haven't already. 
Scan it at the size or larger than the size you want it to end up as. You can 
scan it at 72 resolution unless you are going to make significant changes to 
the image and then maybe 150 resolution (altho some say this doesn't matter 
if it ends up at 72).
4. Never make the scanned image bigger. Work on it at 100% or at least look 
at it periodically at 100%. You can make many adjustments in Photoshop 
filters like Unsharp Mask. (Sharpen>Unsharp Mask - sharpens but you control 
it. Do as the last step) And/or Blur>Gaussian Blur. (Often used on the photo 
itself or a copy of it that sits on the layer below the original image. Then 
you erase the original image in the areas that would look better blurred - 
like for wrinkles on a person's face.) Also, I can't remember if v.4 has 
Adjustment Layers (Layer>New>Adjustment Layer) but you can make tonal 
adjustments on a mask layer that can be turned on and off or changed without 
destroying the image. By the way, whatever you do to it, always do it on a 
copy and keep an original copy untouched.

When you are finished, go to Image>Image Size and change the resolution to 
72, if it isn't already. Play with different levels of jpgs. If it is a 
photo, it would probably be a jpg. I usually save jpgs at medium-3 (or 30, 
depending on what yours says - I think in v.4 the numbers were single digits, 
in v.5 & v.5.5, which I am using it is in double digits). Try Medium with 5 
or High or Max. The difference will be the download time and sometimes there 
is no apparent difference between medium-3 and maximum 8. 

Also, things look different in PS than they do after you make it into a jpg 
(it is a lossy format meaning it compresses the file and looses information). 
And different then when you upload it to the Web. It can look different on 
different screens, Mac/PC OS's/browsers, etc.

Hope this helps.
-Janet

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