Altering images in Photoshop

[SapphireStar]

Okay, Im getting a digital camera hopefully tommorow and Im going to be editing the images in Photoshop. Now Ive seen pictures that have been altered in Photoshop and I was wondering how.

An example is when you have a black and white picture of a person. The complete picture is black and white, yet their eyes are blue. Or look at my sig for example. How does one place colour, even just abit, into a b&w photograph?

Would be mega helpful if anyone could answer and explain how its done thanks! Oh and I use Adobe Photoshop C2.

 

[Eidolon]

A simple way (but doesn't give the best looking result) is to use the lasso tool to select the are you want coloured, and then just brush over it or something. However it doesn't always look great.

Another way is perhaps to make a gradient map layer with the colours that you want, and then erase everything else. That should look nice since it should preserve the luminosity.

I am just guessing so I'm not positive any of these will work. I've never really done work with photos so sorry, can't help you much.

 

[seifer402]

put a gradient map layer of black to white over the photo and then use the layer mask to let colour show through where you want it to

 

[Eidolon]

put a gradient map layer of black to white over the photo and then use the layer mask to let colour show through where you want it to

Yah but I think she's on about when you start off with a b/w picture. Maybe I'm wrong.

 

[seifer402]

ah ok my bad, you could probably just brush over the area with a colour, or even fill it, then set it to like colour or something in the blending options, might not look all that great though, also colour balance, gradient maps, etc. could be used