Photoshop Gurus Forum
Welcome to Photoshop Gurus forum. Register a free account today to become a member! It's completely free. Once signed in, you'll enjoy an ad-free experience and be able to participate on this site by adding your own topics and posts, as well as connect with other members through your own private inbox!
text problems
- Thread starter Leejune
- Start date
AppleCider
Power User
- Messages
- 400
- Likes
- 2
Leejune, that tells me you're probably on the wrong layer. I took a look at that tute, and when you load the Alpha 1 selection you should be on the same layer that you rendered the Lighting effects on (the white-filled layer). It looks gold with the Lighting Effects added, but the point of this exercise is to delete all that stuff, leaving just your text.
In that tute, you should have 2 layers: the background filled layer, and a white filled layer that you rendered the Lightning on. You shouldn't have a "text" layer; your text was completely rendered in an Alpha channel for this particular tute.
Good luck, and welcome to PS Gurus!
In that tute, you should have 2 layers: the background filled layer, and a white filled layer that you rendered the Lightning on. You shouldn't have a "text" layer; your text was completely rendered in an Alpha channel for this particular tute.
Good luck, and welcome to PS Gurus!
Thanks so much for responding Julie, still have not got it 100% correct, although a little better. Guess I am going to have to work on it a little more, and see if I can understand what I am doing. Am very new at this, but excited about learning more. If you happened to look in Photoshop General, had a problem with Mercator tutorial as well today, and find that the item I was missing in the instructions was because I did not have version 7 of PS. Will keep on a-truckin':\
AppleCider
Power User
- Messages
- 400
- Likes
- 2
Leejune, working at it is what we all do 
We've all made mistakes, been puzzled, tried stuff, had happy accidents and the "omigod what's THIS mess?" You're in for quite a ride, but it's fun and rewarding!
We've all made mistakes, been puzzled, tried stuff, had happy accidents and the "omigod what's THIS mess?" You're in for quite a ride, but it's fun and rewarding!
G
Guest
Guest
Nice Avatar Leejune 
Leejune, in fact this message means the following:
1/ To do something with certain pixels, and not with others, you have to select them.
2/ Or, to look at it in another way: you can protect the pixels that you don't want to change with a mask (like protecting the wincow pane when you want to paint the wood of the window).
These two are the same, but talk about other things. A mask is more easy to remember because it is visible (like the tape on the window pane). Photoshop can remember a mask when you store it in a channel, and this channel is called an "alpha-channel". Just like you have a channel for each basic colour, for example a Red, Green and Blue channel.
A very basic mask would consist of only a masked area, and an area that you can work on, in other words: like a simple black and white image.
But in Photoshop you can do more: you can make that certain masked pixels are partly influenced by your action. Therefore, instead of only black and white, you have 126 different shades of grey at your disposal. Your mask can go from black (protected, you can't influence the pixels that are masked) to white (your action will change the pixels completely) with another 124 greys in between. The darker greys will protect more, the lighter ones will be more influenced by your action.
Now exactly in the center between black and white is a hue called "medium grey". Pixels that correspond with this hue in the mask are 50% influenced, and 50% protected.
To go back to where we started from: a mask and a selection are the same, but seen from an opposite point of view.
The problem is that masks are like greyscale images, but selections are visible with the help of the marching ants that surround it.
Right. This is easy when iwe talk about black and white, but where should the ants march when there is a soft transition of greyscales? Ahh, to solve this problem, the designers of Photoshop agreed to place the marching ants around an area that is at least covered for 50%. (that corresponds with medium grey in the mask).
And when no pixels that are at least covered for 50% are selected, you get this message that you got.
I, myself, did not understand all this in the beginning, but suddenly it went ahaa, and since then, I get on much better in PS.
1/ To do something with certain pixels, and not with others, you have to select them.
2/ Or, to look at it in another way: you can protect the pixels that you don't want to change with a mask (like protecting the wincow pane when you want to paint the wood of the window).
These two are the same, but talk about other things. A mask is more easy to remember because it is visible (like the tape on the window pane). Photoshop can remember a mask when you store it in a channel, and this channel is called an "alpha-channel". Just like you have a channel for each basic colour, for example a Red, Green and Blue channel.
A very basic mask would consist of only a masked area, and an area that you can work on, in other words: like a simple black and white image.
But in Photoshop you can do more: you can make that certain masked pixels are partly influenced by your action. Therefore, instead of only black and white, you have 126 different shades of grey at your disposal. Your mask can go from black (protected, you can't influence the pixels that are masked) to white (your action will change the pixels completely) with another 124 greys in between. The darker greys will protect more, the lighter ones will be more influenced by your action.
Now exactly in the center between black and white is a hue called "medium grey". Pixels that correspond with this hue in the mask are 50% influenced, and 50% protected.
To go back to where we started from: a mask and a selection are the same, but seen from an opposite point of view.
The problem is that masks are like greyscale images, but selections are visible with the help of the marching ants that surround it.
Right. This is easy when iwe talk about black and white, but where should the ants march when there is a soft transition of greyscales? Ahh, to solve this problem, the designers of Photoshop agreed to place the marching ants around an area that is at least covered for 50%. (that corresponds with medium grey in the mask).
And when no pixels that are at least covered for 50% are selected, you get this message that you got.
I, myself, did not understand all this in the beginning, but suddenly it went ahaa, and since then, I get on much better in PS.
Wow, Erik, thank you so much for your explanations, have copied the text and the images and will study them diligently. Right now, I might say am a little confused, but will practise with the images, and probably that will clear things up. Do appreciate you taking the trouble to do this for me. Am very enthusiastic, so think that will see me through all this stuff -
EVENTUALLY!
EVENTUALLY!
G
Guest
Guest
"Flintstone" 
Just thought of a way to make it a bit less foggy:
1/ Open a new document and set it to white. Size doesn't matter. Click on the icon (see image above) to set foreground colour to black and background to white.
2/ Take your selection tool and look at the toolbar: make shure that anti-alias is unchecked
3/ Drag a selection on the document, and make it not too small. You see the marching ants. Every pixel inside the marching ants area will be changed by whatever action you undertake. So take your fill tool (the bucket) and click inside the selection. Immediately it will be filled with the foreground colour, black. Click Ctrl/Cmd and Z to undo the fill. You're back at the white doc.
4/ Change to Mask mode (see images above. To be more correct: this mode is called QuickMask mode). You will now see that the area which you selected is still white, while the area that you did not select is covered by a reddish veil. This colour red can be changed if you want to, and its transparancy also, depending on your needs.
5/ Now click on the Selection mode button (see image above) to go back to the selection, and the marching ants will be there.
6/ Now go to the Selection menu, and choose Feather. A dialog box opens and you have to enter some number. Take a big one, say 50 pixels. This means that your selection will be fading gently into the background. The marching ants don't really show this because they can't. Follow the same method from above and fill with black. You will see that the black
really becomes grey at the borders of the selection and faces into the white. Ctrl/Cmd+Z to go back to the white document.
7/ The selection/marching ants can't show you this transition area, but a mask can: change to quickmask mode, and you will notice how the red veil slowly fades into the white of the document, indicating that there is an area that will be gradually influenced.
8/ Now take your brush tool and draw some lines on your mask (also inside the white area).
-When you draw with black, you will add to the red veil.
-Click the small icon to toggle foreground and background colours and draw with white. You take a way from the red veil.
-Now doubleclick on the foreground colour icon. The colours palette will open. Go to the boxes that say R, G, and B. These tell how much red, green and blue is in the colour. Fill in for each one 170. When these three values are identical, you have a grey. This one will be light because the values 170 are rather high. (0 is the minimum, and 255 is the maximum). Add some lines with this grey in the white area.
9/ Click the small icon once again to go back to black foreground and white background colour.
10/ Click back to selection mode and look at the marching ants. They may well follow another path now.
12/ and finally, take your paintbucket and fill the selection with black. Click Ctrl/Cmd+H to hide the marching ants and see what you did to the real selection by painting on the mask with white, black and a grey.
hope this clears things up a bit...
1/ Open a new document and set it to white. Size doesn't matter. Click on the icon (see image above) to set foreground colour to black and background to white.
2/ Take your selection tool and look at the toolbar: make shure that anti-alias is unchecked
3/ Drag a selection on the document, and make it not too small. You see the marching ants. Every pixel inside the marching ants area will be changed by whatever action you undertake. So take your fill tool (the bucket) and click inside the selection. Immediately it will be filled with the foreground colour, black. Click Ctrl/Cmd and Z to undo the fill. You're back at the white doc.
4/ Change to Mask mode (see images above. To be more correct: this mode is called QuickMask mode). You will now see that the area which you selected is still white, while the area that you did not select is covered by a reddish veil. This colour red can be changed if you want to, and its transparancy also, depending on your needs.
5/ Now click on the Selection mode button (see image above) to go back to the selection, and the marching ants will be there.
6/ Now go to the Selection menu, and choose Feather. A dialog box opens and you have to enter some number. Take a big one, say 50 pixels. This means that your selection will be fading gently into the background. The marching ants don't really show this because they can't. Follow the same method from above and fill with black. You will see that the black
really becomes grey at the borders of the selection and faces into the white. Ctrl/Cmd+Z to go back to the white document.
7/ The selection/marching ants can't show you this transition area, but a mask can: change to quickmask mode, and you will notice how the red veil slowly fades into the white of the document, indicating that there is an area that will be gradually influenced.
8/ Now take your brush tool and draw some lines on your mask (also inside the white area).
-When you draw with black, you will add to the red veil.
-Click the small icon to toggle foreground and background colours and draw with white. You take a way from the red veil.
-Now doubleclick on the foreground colour icon. The colours palette will open. Go to the boxes that say R, G, and B. These tell how much red, green and blue is in the colour. Fill in for each one 170. When these three values are identical, you have a grey. This one will be light because the values 170 are rather high. (0 is the minimum, and 255 is the maximum). Add some lines with this grey in the white area.
9/ Click the small icon once again to go back to black foreground and white background colour.
10/ Click back to selection mode and look at the marching ants. They may well follow another path now.
12/ and finally, take your paintbucket and fill the selection with black. Click Ctrl/Cmd+H to hide the marching ants and see what you did to the real selection by painting on the mask with white, black and a grey.
hope this clears things up a bit...
Thanks again Erik, will let you know as soon as I am free to try out your suggestions, it is one of those days when there are too many interferences with Photoshop activities. But I guess one has to shop to eat, etc. etc.[doh] Really appreciate the help I am getting here, have so much to learn.
Your last instructions really helped and have been fooling with the selections and a photo. Am including the photo I did (my hubby years ago!) and see if you think I am on the right track. BTW, the pictures really helped to put things together as well. Appreciate your help Eric, thanks again.
Nothing as encourageing as seeing that one learns how to explain things in a way that people can understand. This is rather dry stuff, but it is necessary to really get a deeper insight, and it will help you with everything you will do in PS, even with the more so-called "difficult things".
Thanks for trying things out, and: keep up the enthusiasm and the good work.
Thanks for trying things out, and: keep up the enthusiasm and the good work.