First Attempt at Colourizing

[t.hawksley]

What a Top Job Wish I Understood Layers.

[roadrunner465]

Can someone tell me how to open an image using CMYK. I use photoshop 7 and would like to have more choice with colors. I am not really sure how CMYK works, but If I can learn how to open it, I can learn to use it.
Thanks

[dennford]

Thats easy,
        I love the easy ones!!!!!!. Open your image, go to image and from the dropdown box click on mode and then change from rgb to cmyk.

                                    Denn

[deadants]

I learned this method last year. I use because I find I can manipulate the colours much easier with curves. You can find the full tutorial on this method at http://www.worth1000.com/tutorial.asp?sid=161018&page=1

[Traysha]

I've had my first go at colourising. My question is, if it's a sepia photo do you take the hue and saturation down to make it grayscale first? I did it from the sepia and the result was quite good.

However I did another from grayscale and found I could keep the white shirt and grey suit without much work on it. With a bit of practise I toned down lip and eye colour with the opacity slider bar which gave a more natural colour. The problem I had was giving the skin some life. I tried selecting a portion of the cheek and putting a bit of colour on but it was never the right shade, came up green or blue etc.

Any suggestions. Can we post photos yet using rootschat?

Pat

[Traysha]

hi

It has posted. The above is my version of my mum Daisy. Prints out a bit wishy-washy. Does it need more contrast?

Now here is my colour from a grayscale. Daisy and dad John.

Couldn't do his eye brows and his hair should be blacker. See what I mean about the flat skin tone?
OOOps  posted a sepia version.....never mind.

P.S  I think they had had a row, hence the glum faces.

Pat

[Keith Bateman]

Keith
I am a new beginner to Colourizing and I found your work very useful as a tutorial.
I now know about layers and how many I might have to use for each picture. I am not use how to use the CMYK mode. Do you know how.
I have much to learn but thanks for your fort.
What do you think of the graphics pad?

You might not have noticed the date on the first post of mine - 2005 - after a year of trying I am slowly getting better!!
Don't now use the graphics pad much these days - since I found the "magnetic lasso" tool and realise you can join bits together of the same colour using the "add to selection" tool along the top row - I then go to "create a new fill" button open colour balance window and add the colour that way.

Have a look at my page - paying particular attention to what I wrote at the bottom!!
http://batemans-history.rootschat.net/photorestoration.htm

Time, Practice and lots of Patience are the things you need.

Cheers

Keith

[deadants]

I tried a few things. First I tried to sharpen the image a bit by duplicating the image Layer and applying a High Pass Filter the changing the blend mode to hard light so it becomes visable again. Next I adjusted the Levels to try and get the right amount of brightness etc. Then I created a blank new Layer and called it cheeks. Next I selected a large soft brush, dropped opacity of the brush to about %25 then I selected a red color for the cheeks and just dabbed the blush on the cheeks. If it's a bit strong you can decrease the cheek Layer opacity to your liking. Next I added a bit more white to the eyes by using a quick mask selection, adjusted the levels of the eyes then adjusted the Hue and Saturation to finish.

Wow, what is he talking about you ask yourself. After fooling around with the software for a couple of weeks, you should start to see there are literally dozens of ways you can make the same adjustments.

[dennford]

         Here is a tip I got some 50yrs ago from "old dondo", my art teacher - Mr Donaldson. Aparantly it is an old artists trick goingback centuries, he told us that the truest looking black actually had a touch of blue in it although the blue in this example is slightly over the top. But I'm sure you get the idea..
         Second tip, although I'm not too sure it has done the pic' any good. To harden the features a little (it still has no more detail in the shadows or highlights) I duplicated the image added 10% high pass filter and changed the blend mode to soft light.
           Of the two I would without a doubt say the blue/black is the most usefull.
                                                Denn