Expert: LizaL - 11/12/2004

Question
Lisa,

Thanks again for all of your help.  I have a couple of follow ups.  You said it sounds like everything that I want can be accomplished by th ecllor replacer tool.  I tried that but it only adjusts the H S L and the image was no where quite close to what I needed,.  It was clear that the R G B values were needed.  How do i accomplish what I want your way. How do I accomplish what I want my way.  I want to compare the two.  Also maybe a brief step by step might be good as I am a new user to this program.
Thanks for your help,
God Bless.
Don Crosby Jr.
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Followup To
Question -
Lisa,

Thanks for the good information it is very helpful. Paint Shop Pro has a menu set up on top, like Excell or internet explorer, and is easy to use.  yes it does have some neat features. I have some follow up questions for you.  I went to the replace function and there you can change the Hue Sat. and Lum in % and the Fuzziness.  I did that but the picture was lacking the Red Green and blue.  So I looked around and found under  adjust, levels.  You see input levels 0 1.00 255 channels rgb r g b  then output level  0 255.
The head I am using has the following
147 R 82 G 82 B 0% h 44% s 58% l   C 34% M 72%  Y 59%  K 19%  

The color I want to match it to
215 R 87 G 63 B 3% h 34% s 24% l   C 11% M 80%  Y 82%  K 2%

when I do the h s l and fuzziness settings the color changes but you see that it is lacking the R G B values.  I can adjust those four values all night  but I will not get the same skin tone. How can you, the R G B values have not been changed, how do I do that.

I found  for R G B changes I think, image/levels  there is an input level 0  1.00 255 and an output level 0 255 these are default settings.  Can you explain each of these numbers and what they do.  Also what is the C M Y K values mean and what do they do.  It seems to me if you have the head pictured by itself, and change it to the color numbers I want to match it to above, the head should be the same as the color I want to match them to.  In other words say I want the head color to match the arm color of the body it is going on, should not using the arm colors on the head give you a head that matches an arm perfectly.

I appreciate your help.

God Bless,
Don
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Followup To
Question -
I use PSP 5.0 and have for years.  I was given a copy of Photoshop 6.0  by a friend who upgraded to the latest version. I have a friend that I make custom cards for. I will put his head on another body.  His complint the head's skin tone never matches that of the skin tone of the body.  I saw recently where Photoshop has a feature where you lasso the head, and in one step you match the head's skin to the bodies skin tone.  Does this feature exist on Photoshop 6, and what is the step by step process to do this.  If this feature is not in this version, how would I do it.  Also this feature would be good to say shirt color or pant color of my friend.

I appreciate your help in this matter.
God Bless,
Don Crosby jr
Answer -
Hi Don,

Hope you enjoy using Photoshop! I've never been a PSP user, but I hear it does some neat things too.

I think the feature you're referring to is Match Color, and that's only found in Photoshop 7. But there's a way for you to make skin tones a bit more "matched" in 6. I'll try to explain it here:

I'm going to assume you're using layers to compose the photos. That is, you'll put the guy's new head on the existing body, and the head will be on a separate layer.

Once you get the head the way you want it, and once you have it positioned correctly, merge your layers.

Now, in the tool box, select the eyedropper tool. Click on the skin tone of the head. This gives Photoshop a sample of the color you want to change.

Now go to the Image pulldown menu, select Adjustments, and from there select Replace Color. Make sure you have Selection checked, below the image box.

In the lower right of this dialog box, you should see a swatch of color, and it should be the same color you chose when you clicked on the head with the eyedropper tool.

Where you see Hue, Saturation and Lightness, there are sliders underneath. These let you change the amounts of color and light that make up that color you chose. As you move the sliders, you'll see the color change.

Move the sliders until the color swatch matches the skin tone of the guy's body in your picture.

By the way, the Fuzziness part of this dialog box refers to how closely you want Photoshop to "define" the color. In other words, the higher the number you put in this box, the more Photoshop will look around for pixels of the color you chose.

Also bear in mind that when you use Replace Color, it's an overall effect. That is, if there are pixels of the skin tone color in another part of the image -- like in clothing or the background -- those will be changed, too. So keep an eye out for what you're changing, and make sure you don't accidentally change something you didn't want to change!

Hope this helps. And if you need to, please post back!

Lisa
Answer -
Hi Don,

Actually, you don't want to use Levels for what you're doing here. Levels and Curves adjust the tonality of the color in a document, and won't actually change the colors like Replace Color can.

Actually, when you use Replace Color, you ARE working from the RGB values. The color swatch that you measure is made up of red, green and blue values. When you change the hue, you're changing the color. And the saturation is the amount of that color you're changing to, and the lightness is the amount of light used. But the RGB values here are measured in + or - values, not actual RGB numbers. Rest assured, if you're working on an RGB image, those levels in the Replace Color dialog box refer to RGB.

CMYK stands for Cyan, Magenta, Yellow and Black. This is a color model used for printing -- that is, traditional offset printing, as opposed to Web work, which is measured in RGB.

As I mentioned, using Levels adjusts the overall tonality of an image. Under the Input Levels area, the three sliders represent, from left to right, the amount of shadow, midtones, and highlight in the picture. Under Output, the left slider adjusts shadow and the right one controls highlights.

Your theory of matching makes sense, but it might be causing you a lot more work. You can certainly match the values that way, and numerically it might make sense, but you need to stick to one color model. If you're having these cards printed, use CMYK. If not, use RGB. It won't work to combine two color models in one image.

Everything you describe to me that you want to do sounds like it could be accomplished using Replace Color, and that's what I'd use, for sure. Try experimenting with it some more and let me know what happens.

Hope this helps!

Lisa  

Answer
Hi again Don,

I understand you tried the Replace Color tool, and that doesn't seem to work for you. But I also think that if this technique doesn't work for you, two things are happening:

1. Your version of Photoshop, v.6, doesn't support the best way of matching sking tones. As I mentioned in my original answer to you, Match Color would be a great tool for doing what you need to do, and so would Shadows and Highlights. Unfortunately, those features are both only available in Photoshop CS.

2. You asked if I could list out how to achieve your goal using my advice, and I've already done that. You also asked how to achieve what you want using your way, but that would mean I would have to go back to my original answer! And this really isn't the forum for teaching Photoshop. It would be very hard and result in a huge post for me to try and list out all the steps and the color theory behind each step, in order to walk you through all the ins and outs of RGB.

You mentioned that you're a new user to Photoshop, and that makes this even harder. I'm sure you're great at using PSP, since you talked about having used it for years. But it does differ from Photoshop. I'm sorry, but this also isn't a forum in which I can actually "teach" a new user how to work in Photoshop.

I do teach Photoshop online, on a freelance basis, and I would be happy to do that if you're interested. But I'm teaching CS now, not v.6. If you think you'll be upgrading soon and would like to learn more, you could contact me through my Web site. Post your email address and I'll send you a mail on how to get to my site.


Anyway, what I think I should do is defer to some tutorials I found that I think might help. This wasn't too easy, because most of the good and applicable tutorials are using Photoshop CS. But I think what I found will apply to version 6.

1. http://www.photoshoplover.com/search.php
This whole section is on handling skin. If for some reason this page doesn't show you tutorials on skin tones, to go www.photoshoplover.com and search for the word 'skin'.

2. http://www.carlvolk.com/photoshop16.htm
They're doing a lot of color changes with textiles here, but it could help you understand the different color adjustment tools.

3. http://photoshop911.com/
This site has a lot of tutorials, and also a means of submitting a question to be answered by their staff.


Hope this helps!

Lisa