change bitmap black channel to colour?

Hi,
Does anyone know if it is possible to change the black channel in a B&W bitmap to a specified colour?

I would still like the white areas to be naturally transparent in Illustrator, once placed.

Cheers,

Matt,

Switch to RGB, convert to Layer 0, use magic wand to select black. Use edit>fill to change color. Invert Selection and delete white. Now save as a file type that illustrator can handle. PSD, EPS or Tif ought to work.

A bitmap can only be black and white and does not support transparency, so you have to convert it to get what you want.

Rich

Thanx Rich,
I thought that was the case. The reason that I would've preferred to remain as a bitmap is to keep the file size low & that a placed bitmap in Illustrator naturally knocks out the white areas to be transparent.

So, to have the white background remain transparent for a placed RGB image, I'll have to include a transparency in the form of a .psd?

Does a .tif support transparency?

Is there anyway to further reduce the file size of the image (all that white space seems to be a waste), besides LZW compression?

Cheers,

Tif does support transparency. Not sure of the answer to your second question. There are other image types that support transparency, like gif, and ping, but I don't know if those will work in Illustrator.

Rich

wrote...

Hi,
Does anyone know if it is possible to change the black channel in a B&W

bitmap to a specified colour?

I would still like the white areas to be naturally transparent in

Illustrator, once placed.

Hi Matt.

I made a bitmap file in PSE, drew a line, and copied the entire image. I switched to AI and pasted this. It is a black line with transparent background, and I can see objects whoich I draw and place behind it.

Is this what you want to do?

Ed

Ed,

I think he wanted the bitmap to have a color other than black.

Rich

wrote...

Ed,

I think he wanted the bitmap to have a color other than black.
Rich

I was able to select my transparent bitmap and change the color of the black pixels to ssomething else.

Ed

Ed,
was your bitmap an actual 1 channel or something else like RGB/CMYK etc.

If it is a single channel bitmap, I would love to know how you changed the black to another colour!

Cheers guys,