Color Screening digital pictures

Galmour shots charges $75 to do this black and white with a color emphasis thing. Well, their lab does the work, and they use photoshop (amazing the information you can get if you're friendly and play dumb). They also showed me their technique and a few other useful tricks....

Step 1: Grab and image and make a new layer

I never work on the original layer, I always use a copy - you can always turn off the base layer.

Make any adjustments to this layer... adjust curves, light levels etc. This is a good time to clean up skin blemishes etc. (I did not do so for this picture, this was just a quick write up as an example).

Comments

[DataPeopleGraphics]

Great editing of your image. I think if you want to further manipulate your image there is an option in Photoshop called "mask".. i wonder you definitely use this option to further show your art creativity....


Thanks...

[glycerinate]

GIMP IS AWESOME! I love it since its entirely cross platform! (i have ubuntu linux!)

[Arbitror]

I officially hate Ubuntu when they came out with Karmic 9.10! I use openSUSE now, you should try it.

[Daniel Morales]

Here's mine!!! used PhotoShop CS2!!! not hard @ all!! would be easier with a drawing tablet, but I'm broke, unemployed and can't buy one yet, some day... some day!, and I am interested in HDR photography too!, she's my daughter with my wife, here  in Puerto Rico, greetz!

[Dr.Paj]

This is what I did for my poster. I posted it on the Instructable that I learned the stencil technique from, but this is what I did for the robot's eyes and the laptop screen. I also changed the laptop screens color. Tell me what to think, I'm new to Photoshop and would appreciate any help.

[foxtrot4697]

this is easier than i expected

[takroc]

I have to agree with fungus amungus. I am a graphic artist and have used Photoshop for a very long time. All you need to do is add a layer mask to the b/w layer and using a brush, "paint" black on the mask to add the color. If you make a mistake simply press the "x" key to change to change the color to white and repaint to remove your mistake. No need for the history pallet or undo keys. You can also switch the color and b/w layers to do the opposite.

[edge_666]

As a Graphic Artist with experience you shouldn't even have a b/w layer. You should be using an adjustment layer to make the image b/w and then editing the mask on that adjustment layer.

That way you are not even touching the original photo, so there is no need for any of it and you have more control than using the desaturate method.

[jcdlvsrbld]

you should also adjust the levels of the colored image so it looks a bit more natural

[KABUKISTAR]

Good tutorial. For doing all this, I reccomend using the GIMP, a good, free, non-commercial image editing program. Also, I find it works better if you put the colour layer on top, and then earse away the parts that you want to be in black and white.

[jcdlvsrbld]

Gimp is fine, i use it on my linux laptop, but i prefer photoshop, since masking is better and easier. plus, it's easier to do anything a bit more advanced, and my graphics tablet works better under photoshop.

[binnie]

gimp is a free verion of photoshop thats all.. it does almost everything photoshop does and you can use the same addons. the professionals and stuff will most likley say photoshop is better --- just like the MAC users say mac is better THEY ARE ARROGANT

[Jhmdean]

Lol yes we are!  All of us, because I've met every single mac owner.  Although Gimp is great, perhaps more people would take notice of your comments if you didn't make raging accusations about people you haven't met.  Just saying. :)

[trebuchet03]

Yes, that works too :P It's just easier to erase less (what can I say, I'm lazy). I love GIMP :D I tried to make the isntructions as universal as possible, which is why I did not take screen shots of the tool buttons or anything :P

[zachninme]

With something like this, you could probably do a select by color or magic wand...

[jcdlvsrbld]

if you use the magic wand or the masking tools, you can simply select the area you want to be in color and delete it, without having to erase.

[J-Manoo7]

great instructable, i had to figure this one out on my own after seeing slides on youtube.. should've came here first

[williamkidd]

awesome instructable! heres my picture with a old vw bus ..

[inquisitive]

Thanks, I love this effect and between your instructable and the comments always tend to learn something new!

[glycerinate]

i just did it too :D

[fionaleigh]

another way to do this is use the paintbrush to select what you want colored, then select the inverse, and then remove the saturation from that. i never even thought of doing it this way, but it's kind of cool

[future3003]

Waaaaay cool! I love this.

[future3003]

Oops forgot to post picture

[Chanio]

Nice!
THX.
I will do it, but by using the PATH tool...
It lets you mark points that you would like to join to form a shape.

So, in your example, it would draw two tiny shapes similar to rectangles.
After drawing the shapes, go to see the path layers window...
You should now convert the path to a simple selection (button: path to selection). And erase the path or create a new blank one.

Returning to the layer window, you have your two stripes selected.
So just copy them.
Then create a new layer on top of the background layer.
Select the new layer and paste on it.
Fix the stripes on the new layer.with the anchor button.
After having your colored stripes copied over the layer on top of the colored background layer...
Select the background layer again.
And choose the menu option: Layers/Colors/Desaturate'' to get the grey image convertion.
Then you have the same efect in an alternative way.GIMP rules fantasy world!

[lukus001]

If you convert the RGB image to LAB the black and white picture will look alot better... While the image is in full colour: Image > mode > LAB in photoshop (i think) Go to the channels window and remove the (a) and (b) channels, leaving only the lightness channel...

[Deightine]

If you feel like having a learning moment (this can take a few hours to master) I find it easier to just use Masking. Of course, this is a little photoshop specific, but eh. I like GIMP as well, but it's not -quite- caught up to my needs yet. What I do is duplicate the first layer, and manually desaturate it using the color level tool, to maintain as much of the original clarity as possible. This new layer I select on the layer panel, and click the little button in that sub-window with the circle inside the dark square, that sets the layer to masking and creates a second preview pane. By selecting the masking pane (on the layer list), you can paint away the layer, or paint it back in... Allowing you to keep -all- of the original detail to the image, and touch up as you like. You never truly need the undo tool again.

[JJ_Jackson1]

I appreciate the fact that you include TRUE English spelling :)

[Freddo]

Another tool to do this is http://www.recolored.com/ check out the gallery and the tutorials!

I got a B&W picture of my mother dating back from 1956. A few retries later, to get used to the application, I had it in colors, and it looked really good.

No need to use layers and no need to be really precise, you just draw approximatively with your mouse the surfaces in the color you want them. The only tricky part is not under/over doing it, especially details like lips, eyes, eyebrows, necklaces and such. The results are amazing.

Have fun!
Freddo

[andreq]

You could use a vector shape on a masking layer... this is the ultimate undo tool :D

[fungus amungus]

Interesting. To make your life a little easier you should try using the masking tool instead of just erasing. Gives you much more undo options.