Black and Whites

[page_tyson]

I often see pictures in black and white with part of the picture still in color. How is this done in photoshop? Is there some special way to do it, or would you just carefully select the image you want to stay in color and change the rest of the image to black and white? Here are some examples. http://www.thephotoforum.com/forum/nature-wildlife/202297-spring-pictures.html

 

[scorpion_tyr]

What you're talking about is selective coloring. I kind of like doing it, and a lot of the friends and family I do shots for like it, but it seems a lot of the photogs here don't like it, or are at least very picky about it.

I don't use photoshop, but I do it in Gimp. I just open the image, select a new layer from visible, desaturate in the manner I like for the image, and then erase the B&W top layer of whatever I want to be color. Seems to work well for me I guess. Here's some examples:

http://i469.photobucket.com/albums/rr60/scorpion_tyr/IMG_4306e.jpg

 

[SLRJoe]

The way it's generally done (as far as I know) is one of two ways.
1)
* Add an adjustment layer to completely desaturate the image.
* Add a layer mask to this adjustment layer
* Now, with the layer mask selected, using a suitably small brush with an opacity set to around 20% start to paint over the area you wish to bring back into colour. (paint using black, as black hides the layer mask, white brings it to the fore)

2)
* use the pen tool to draw around the item you wish in colour
* make a selection of the pen path and copy and paste the element of the image into a new layer
* desaturate the original layer.

 

[shmne]

The best way to do selective coloring is to go into your program files, move photoshop (or gimp, depending on what you have) into the recycle / trash bin. Then empty said container. :greendev: