[Alan]

Hi , What is the best way to add a splash of colour back to a black and white photo.
Using elements or Photoshop CS2 .

[danpen]

I've had some success with the following method ...

Open your B&W image
Create a new, empty layer
Set the blending mode to darken
Add colour, the texture of the underlying image shows through

I found it useful to create one new layer per colour as this gives you the ability to fine tune with layer opacity, different blending modes and masking out areas of overspill, part masking areas where two colours blend etc.

I also got some good results with using the same method but cloning in say a section of grass from another image onto the new layer and then gaussian blurring it to get a less even colour whilst still retaining the original texture rather than the cloned texture.

Similarly a bit of dodge and burn, or add noise can create the less flat colour that's probably desirable.

I've purposfully left these tips quite high level as I don't have time to create a full tutorial but if you'd like further details let me know.

I'm sure someone else will be along in a minute with a totally different approach - the beauty of photoshop! But I think experimentation is the key, find a solution that fits your image and talents.

cheers

Daniel

[fionaB]

same as dan but instead of chosing darken as the blend mode choose color ( american spelling i know) then use the opacity to tone it down. be very very careful when doing skin tones........ useful to take a sample off a similar aged person in a photo with similar lighting.

Fi

[Rob Barron]

Yes, it really does depend on what you mean. If you want to hand colour a mono picture that is entirely different but if you want to selectively add some colour back to a picture then you can do all sorts of things. The most obious is to take a colour picture, make a duplicate layer, convert that layer to mono in which ever way you prefer, probably best to use Channel Mixer as you can't change the mode of the image to greyscale (that would turn the other layer to mono too), and then to erase through to the coloured areas you want to keep. You can of course do the same thing by selecting the area you want coloured and then hitting Backspace to remove the selected area.

So, let us know if that answers your question Alan or whether you want to pain in some colour on a mono in which case the answer is different and I'd need to give a bit more information.

Cheers,
Rob

[j sotelo]

Alan heres a link that might be useful....

TechnicalLead.com Inc.

and this one is a video tutorial, its very good!!!

ArtWorld -> Tutorials -> Photoshop -> Changing a Black and White image to color // surreal art community, photoshop training & tutorials, photo manipulation

[Alan]

Thanks all
I wil give your techniques a go