Caught between gamma and brightness?

Question

I have a video source that, to my surprise, has a lot more detail than I could at first see. Turning down gamma I could see details in a bright part, turning up gamma I could see details in a darker part. I did experiment with brightness for obvious reasons, as well as with saturation, but I seem to be stuck at 50% of the details. Is there really such a predicament in video reproduction that you have to sacrifice one for the other, is my monitor involved (pre-retina Macbook), or have I simply not found the sweetspot of all those image tweaks?

Answer 1

Your contrast is off. Lower it and change your levels using the Histogram.