Is it possible you’re using the brush tool instead of the eraser tool? The only other scenario I can think of is that you had taken a color photo, added a duplicate layer and de-colorized that duplicate layer. Then using the eraser tool would show the color beneath.
Well, your eraser on the background layer erases with the color of the background color chip. So you must now have your color chips set white and black. (By the way, I’m talking about the color chip in the bottom of your toolbox that you use to determine what color your paintbrush will paint with.) So if you want to erase with say blue just set your bacground color chip to a blue color. Hope this helps.
Terri
By the way, your kind of doing this in a destructive way. You’d be better off doing this by painting on a seperate layer over your photo…lowering the opacity of the paint layer so you can see the details in the B and W background. Or by using selections and a series of Hue/Saturation layers with colorize option set. Hope this doesn’t sound too preachy…just thought I’d pass along some alternative ways of colorizing.
Terri
Try it this way:
Open your image. Duplicate the Background layer.
With the duplicate layer active, add a Hue/Saturation adjustment layer (on the Layers palette, click the little half moon button for the menu). In the Hue/Saturation box, desaturate the image by moving the Saturation slider all the way to the left. Click OK.
From the Blending mode menu on the Layers palette, select Color blend mode. Also on the Layers palette, click on the white square (a.k.a. the mask) on the Hue/Saturation layer.
Now, using the Brush tool, paint with black on the image over the areas you want to have color. If you make a mistake, switch to white and re-paint.
You can make other adjustment layers to the background duplicate too, grouping the layers as needed to keep your color showing through.
That’s the basics of how I do it. There are other ways too, but to me that’s the easiest one and a lot safer than using the eraser!
Patti
Patti Anderson, from your instructions, I am a bit puzzled over the step that says, " from the blending mode menu on the Layers palette, select Color blend mode." If I am looking in the proper place, I have two choices color burn and color dodge. Where is "color blend" or am I misunderstanding the wording?
They are all "blend" modes.
Patti just meant "color" option, I’m pretty sure.
Mac
Pat you should have color second from the bottom of the list. Of course I’m not sure that is what she is referring to.
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Have A Nice Day, 🙂
James Hutchinson
http://www.pbase.com/myeyesview http://www.myeyesviewstudio.com/ wrote in message
Patti Anderson, from your instructions, I am a bit puzzled over the
step that says, " from the blending mode menu on the Layers palette, select Color blend mode." If I am looking in the proper place, I have two choices color burn and color dodge. Where is "color blend" or am I misunderstanding the wording?
Yes, I meant choose "Color" down at the bottom of the drop down list (second from the bottom). It is technically a blending mode, but my phrasing was a bit confusing. Sorry about that.
Patti
Patti, I tried your method (msg #4) and it works great, but I have a question. In the Hue/Saturation layer, why do you change the blend mode to Color? I seem to get identical results with the default blend mode of Normal.
Mark
Mark, "I do it because I read it on the Forum." 🙂 Seriously though, sometimes, I really don’t know why I do things one way or the other, usually it’s a result of playing, trying ideas from other people…and in the end finding what works for me.
I change the blend mode to the Color because it preserves the gray levels (subtle shading) in the desaturated part of the photo. It will not affect the areas you paint with black, only the desaturated part of your photo. The areas painted with black on the mask are transparent. To see what I mean, click back and forth from Normal to Color and see if you can tell the difference.
As you will discover with this software and this forum, there are many ways to accomplish the same thing! I only put forth one, which to me is easier.
Patti
