Wordless Wednesday - UPDATED & with words

Well, I know this is supposed to be Wordless Wednesday but since it is sooo close to Thursday now I figured, what the heck, why not throw some words in there. BOL! My Mom couldn't decide which picture she liked best so that's why she put both in there...kind of like a before and after. :) Anyway, a few people have asked how she did that strange photo effect and Mango was wondering who that black and white doggy was. It is VERY confusing Mango and although Mom has explained that it is just MY reflection I still get confused from time to time. Anyway, I will now paw it over to Mom so she can explain.

Love,

Nala


Hi everyone, Amber here. First, I want to say that in NO WAY do I claim to know what I am doing. There are probably much better and easier ways to get this effect but this is the only way I have figured it out.

1. Open your picture file into Photoshop Elements (this is what I am most comfortable in but a different version of Photoshop or Lightroom may work better)

2. Select the lasso tool (it looks like a lasso) on the left side where all the tools are located.

3. Using the lasso, outline the area you want to keep the color in. For me, I outlined Nala on the right side of my photo. My outline is NEVER perfect as going around curves can be tricky but don't worry you can clean that up later. :)

4. Once outlined, right click and then choose Select Inverse. This will tell the computer that the next thing you do should be done to the opposite parts to what you originally outlined with your lasso. Does that make sense???

5. Then right click again and this time choose Fill.

6. From the top pull down menu, choose Background Color and from the bottom one choose Hue. Click ok and VOILA, you have a picture that is partially in color and partially in B&W.

7. Now, if you need to clean up the edges you can do that with the Clone Stamp tool. It looks like a little stamp pad. Click on it and then you can hold down ALT and click on an area and it will copy that color. Example: If someone had a blemish on their face you could use the clone stamp tool to click on an unblemished part of the skin. It will copy that part and then you can move over to the blemished part and click on it and the unblemished part will cover it. That's how I clean up the edges.

Again, this is all probably backwards but have fun playing with your photos and if anyone tries the "Color Pop" technique I would love to see the results!! :)

For a better way to do this see The Pioneer Woman Blog....she just posted about how to do this using layer masks but I'm not too great at those yet. I will have to play around with it. ;)