How to Make highlights lighter and shadows darker in After Effects CS3

After Effects' Auto Levels effects will help you to do that. The Auto Levels effect maps the lightest and darkest values in each color channel in the image to white and black, and then redistributes the intermediate values. As a result, highlights appear lighter and shadows appear darker. Now let's do this:

1. Import the video file through the menu "File > Import > File".
   
   
   
2. Secondly, drag the video file from the project area to the timeline area.
   
   
   
   
3. Then the video will be displayed in the composition area.
   
   
   
   
4. Select the video in the timeline area by click on it and go to the menu "Effect > Color correction > Auto Levels".
   
   
   
   
5. Now you can modify the values of the Auto Levels effect in the Effect controls area. More information about Auto Levels effect's values, please follow this link Auto levels
   
   
6. Let's compare the original video to the Auto Levels effected video.
   original:
   
   
   Auto levels effected: