How to colorize a photo in Photoshop. Manually coloring a black and white photo in Photoshop

Each of us has an old family album or just some old black and white photos at home. How do you like this idea - to take and take photos in color, fill them with paints?

IN this lesson we will look at a simple way to convert black and white photo in color. For work, I took a black and white photo of a cheetah, this photo During the lesson we will make it in color.

Open our black and white photo using Photoshop programs and first of all, we see that the photo is locked - this can be seen from the lock on the layer. Unlock it so that you can work with it in the future by double-clicking with the left mouse button on this lock.

Now let's start coloring! First let's color the background photo, make it green, to do this, select the layer of our photo by clicking on it once with the left mouse button and selecting top menu Panel "Layers" - "New Adjustment Layer" - "Color Balance".

After this manipulation, a pop-up window will appear with the adjustment layer settings, just click “OK”, leaving the default settings. After that on the right top corner A panel with “sliders” will appear, with which we will adjust the color of our background. Move the sliders and achieve the shade you need.

This way we got a second layer, on which our photo became completely green. Now we will color the cheetah, for this we will again select the layer with black and white photo, by clicking on it once with the left mouse button in the lower right corner of the program panel, and hide the layer with a green tint for a while by clicking once with the left mouse button on the “Eye” icon near this layer.

Now we will select the cheetah, for this we will use the " Quick selection", select this tool in the left panel of the program and adjust its size. After that, let's start selecting the cheetah by holding left button mouse, select the area we need; if you go over the edge or the area is too large, you can erase it by holding down the "Alt" key and the left mouse button.

Having selected the cheetah, again select “Layers” - “New Adjustment Layer” - “Color Balance” in the top menu and, again, moving the sliders, we achieve the shade we need.

During coloring, in any case, the fields of the layers will overlap each other. To fix this (erase or add), you need to select the desired layer, left-click on it and use the eraser tool to erase the unnecessary edges of the layer. If, on the contrary, you need to finish painting the layer a little, then select the “brush” tool and paint over the errors with white. For soft transitions, select " soft brush" and the pressure mode can be set to less than 100%.

And so, we now have 3 layers - this is a black and white photo, an image of a green tint and a selected cheetah in a yellow-brown tint. Now we substitute our green background, to do this, turn on the visibility of our image with a green tint again, select it (by left-clicking) and simply use the Eraser tool to erase the cheetah on it, thereby revealing our layer with the colored cheetah.

Carefully erase the edges of the cheetah (hairs, etc.) with a soft eraser, while you can adjust the pressure of the eraser in places where translucency of the layer is required. For convenience, do not forget to adjust the size of the eraser. In case of blots (if excess has been erased), touch up this place white brush.

Well, we color the cheetah’s eyes in the same way: select the layer with the original photo, select the eyes with the Quick Selection tool and create a new adjustment layer with the necessary color balance. I made them bright yellow).

In order to make the color balance brighter, in the tone adjustment panel (the same one with the sliders), select the “Highlights” label in the “Tone” section, as in the screenshot below and adjust the brightness with the sliders.

So, thanks to simple manipulations of flexible and powerful program photoshop we end up with a not bad result.

Probably everyone had coloring books in their childhood. AND turn a black and white picture into color it wasn't difficult. They simply took pencils or paints and colored the pictures in the book. And what a pleasure it was to watch how gradually black and white picture was becoming color. Now you can do something similar in Photoshop, take and colorize black and white photo. During the coloring process, it will be interesting to observe how the photo changes. There are many ways colorize black and white photo. I suggest one of them. Let's find the old one black and white photograph and open it in Photoshop.

1-File-open.

Before you start coloring, you need to look at the color mode of the photo. Let's go:

2-Image-mode. Convert a photo to RGB mode if it is in a different color mode.

3-Unlock the background layer, in the layers window, double-click on the “background” layer with the left mouse button and click “ok” in the window that appears.

Now you can start coloring.

4-Layer-new-layer. Fill it with some color for the background:

5-Editing - fill. In the “fill in” window, click on the checkbox on the first page and select the word “color”. A color palette window will appear, here select a color - 51300d and “ok”.

6-Go to the layers window and select the “chromatic” blending mode for this layer.

And the photo will look like this:

7-Layer-new-layer. And immediately in the layers window select the blending mode " soft light". On this layer we will paint the hair.

8-On the vertical toolbar, click on the colors button

and, in the color palette window, select a color - 442606. Click "ok".

9-On the toolbar, select brush, with soft edge, size 16-18 px. and dye your hair.

If somewhere you painted more than necessary, you can erase it with an eraser, only then remember to return the brush. Let's soften the hair a little.

10-Filter-blur-Gaussian blur, radius 6.

Now go back to the layers window, on the layer with a brown fill, click on this layer (it will turn blue) and add a layer mask to it. To do this, click on the create mask button. A white rectangle will appear on the layer strip.

Now we need to erase the background from the areas that we will paint. But first, check that the brush is selected and not the eraser; in the layers window, the layer with the mask is active (colored in Blue colour), on the toolbar the foreground and background colors are black and white. If the colors are different, then press D on the keyboard (on the English layout).

Using a brush, we begin to erase the brown background in the photo where it will be painted. To make it easier to erase, select zoom on the toolbar, and at the top and click on the photo to enlarge it. Return the brush tool and erase the background with a brush.

Erase the background from the face, hands, bouquet of flowers, shoe and flowers on the hat. If you erased more in some place, then go to “edit-step back”.

We will paint each area on a new layer.

11-Layer-new-layer. In the layers window, select the blending mode “soft light”. This is a face layer.

Click on the color button on the toolbar, select the color f3c28e and use a brush to paint the face and hands.

12-Layer-new-layer, blending mode "soft light". Here we paint our lips.

Click on the color button again and select color b13a48. Use a soft-edged brush to paint your lips.

13-Layer - new layer, blending mode "soft color". Let's add some blush to the cheeks. Take a brush with a soft edge, size 28 px, color as on the lips and click on each cheek.

14-Filter-Gaussian blur, radius 20-25.

16-Layer-new-layer, blending mode "soft light". We paint our eyes.

17-Click on the colors button, select the color for the iris 22406c and with a soft-edged brush, the size of the iris, click on one eye, then on the other.

18-Layer-new-layer, blending mode "chromatic". On this layer we will paint the shoe, flowers in the bouquet and on the hat. Click on the color button, select color f48693.

19-Layer-new-layer. Blend mode "chroma". This layer is for the leaves of the bouquet. Color 263621.

Now the fun begins! Your task at this stage is to create areas demarcated by color, which does not yet exist! Whether it's the sky, grass, or a shirt, you must use your imagination and worldview to determine what objects each color will go with, and where they begin and end. Photoshop includes various methods choices that can be used at this stage. These are Quick Selection Too, Lasso, Pen ( Pen Tool), and others.

IN in this case I'll select the sky using Quick Selection:

Step 3. Refining the selection

Once your preliminary selection is ready, you should use the Refine Edge tool, especially if you're dealing with tree branches or hair selections

For each image, the Smart Radius value should be selected individually; it depends on the complexity of the selection, the size of the image, etc. Please note in the pictures below I showed the selection state before and after applying the smart radius:

Step 4: Adding Color to the Sky

To apply the tool's action, click OK, after which the “marching ants” will appear again in the working document window. It's time to add color! For this we will use “Curves”, since this adjustment allows you to edit each color channel separately, and thanks to the use of an adjustment layer, we will be able to change the settings if necessary later at any time.

Each object in the image will require various combinations Curves settings, for example, the picture below shows how I achieved blue color by editing the cyan, magenta and yellow channels:

This is what the former black and white sky looks like now:

Step 5: Add Color to the Rest of the Image

Now let's take care of the strip of forest on the horizon. I also selected it with a Quick Selection and then used the Refine Edge tool:

Again use the "Curves" adjustment layer with with the following settings Of course, in your case they may be different. Now the forest has turned green:

All that remains is to color the field. It is not necessary to create a new selection for it; just press Crtl+Shift+I to invert the selected area and then delete the excess (in my case, the top) selected area with any selection tool in the “Subtract from Selection” mode:

Then we give the field with hay a golden color:

This is what the image looks like now:

Step 6: General Color Correction

Adjust the overall saturation using the Hue/Saturation adjustment layer:

And all that remains is to correct the overall tones and contrast again by adding a new “Curves” adjustment layer. Now let's change only the CMYK channel curve:

Well, that seems to be all. We admire the result:

So let's summarize this photo colorization method:

Translation color mode images in CMYK
Creating a selected area for painting
Add color to this area using Curves
General saturation correction
General brightness correction

One of the most familiar themes of sepia-to-color is The Wizard of Oz.

Translator's note: we are talking about the film "The Wizard of Oz", the film begins in sepia, and then colors appear, which was unique for the cinema of that time.

In this tutorial I'll show you how to tint a photo to sepia to create a color image.

Coloring a sepia or black and white photo can seem like a real challenge and can take time and patience, although it can be a lot easier than you think. Today I will show you the process of colorizing a photo in Adobe program Photoshop.

Final result:

Source materials

The image I'm going to use in this tutorial is shown in the screenshot below:

Note: photo taken from http://www.loc.gov/

In my opinion, black and white photography is much easier to work with than sepia, so the first thing I did was convert the photo. This is just my personal preference and you don't have to, if you want and you like working in sepia, then work in sepia.

Translator's note: the author converted a sepia-toned photo into black and white image using correction Black and white(BlackandWhite).

1. Select the desired mode for the picture

Once you've uploaded the photo, you'll need to make sure the picture mode is set to RGB and not on the regime Grayscale(Grayscale), even if your image is monochrome or black and white. To check the mode, for this we go Image - Mode(Image >Mode), now look to the opposite RGB mode there was a tick.

2. We begin to color large fragments of the image

Step 1

Using a tool Quick selection(Quick Select tool), select the sky or any other large fragment of the image that is represented by one color shade.

Using a tool Quick selection(Quick Select tool), select a fragment of the image that is represented by one color shade, for example, the sky.

Step 2

Click the button Refine edge(Refine Edge).

Use the tool Refine edge(Refine Edge) to improve the boundaries of the selected area.

Step 3

In the tool settings window that appears Refine edge(Refine Edge), check the box Smart radius(Smart Radius). I changed the radius value to 5 px, but you can set a different radius value that best suits your image. I also increased the value Smooth(Smoth) up to 3 pixels to soften hard edges. You can also apply other settings of this instrument to improve the boundaries of the selection. When you're ready, click the 'OK' button.

Select the correct value for Smart radius(Smart Radius), as well as for the option Smooth(Smooth).

Step 4

So, we have created an active selection, now click the button Add a New Adjustment Layer(Add New Adjustment Layer) at the bottom of the layers palette and in the window that appears, select the option Color(Solid Color).

Add an adjustment layer Color(Solid Color) through the bottom of the layers palette.

Step 5

Choose the color shade that you think best matches the sky in your image. For now, it doesn't matter whether you chose a color tone that's too bright or not, we'll fix that in a minute. Once you have chosen a color tone, click the 'OK' button and you will see the selection on the adjustment layer mask.

Choose a suitable color shade.

Step 6

Change the blending mode to Overlap(Overlay) and the selected color will look much better. If you are not satisfied with the selected color, then simply double-click on the blue rectangle next to the mask so that a window appears Color palettes(Color Picker), select the color shade that suits you best.

Change the blending mode to Overlap(Overlay).

Step 7

If you are satisfied with the result, you can restore the missing areas of the image or correct them using a soft black/white brush, which you can apply on the adjustment layer mask.

Correct any defects left after selection.