If there are any Photoshop experts around, I need some help.

Here's what I want to do. I have a picture of my family that I want to change. What I want to do is to make the background black & white and leave the family members in color. I have seen it done in other photo's, but can't find a tutorial on doing it on the net anywhere.

So. Can anyone point me to one that explains this process or give me the lowdown on how it is done?

Thanks. :)

Hmmmm I'm definitely no expert, but you could try the magnetic lasso tool (it's in the first column of tools, # 2 from top) to select your family, then use the background as a new layer (which you make b/w and paste the colored family into that background. (did this make any sense ??) .... That's the best I can come up with, you might wanna check with Roem :)

Shakey....I will private message you my g/fs email address. She is really good in photoshop (she kicks my ass) and might be able to help you.

Definitely get in touch with her! :)

Thanks, Smurf! That's kind of what I figured I needed to do. I'm pretty handy with Paint Shop Pro, but I leave a lot to desire when it comes to Photoshop.

Thanks again, Aaron. I shot her an e-mail, so maybe she can give me some pointers.

Originally posted by 80sSmurf
Hmmmm I'm definitely no expert, but you could try the magnetic lasso tool (it's in the first column of tools, # 2 from top) to select your family, then use the background as a new layer (which you make b/w and paste the colored family into that background. (did this make any sense ??) .... That's the best I can come up with, you might wanna check with Roem :)

ya you pretty much have to select the family somehow, which isn't too difficult.
the harder part is to get a smooth transition between the color and the b&w

its much easier to learn stuff on photoshop by people showing you how its done!

Shakey... did you send her that message? She never got it. You sure you spelled her email address right?

It actually got returned to me just a bit ago, with the following explanation - Requested action not taken: exceeded storage allocation. Sounds like she has exceeded the Hotmail storage limit. I'll give it another go though.

Yeah definitely do that. In fact, I watched her log in to her hotmail account this morning and she was only at 17% of her limit.

If it fails again, I will give you an alternative address for her.

Tutorials and How To's on PhotoShop can be found @

http://www.mannmadeimages.com/
http://www.pinoy7.com/

1. draw around your family with the lasso (or select them piece-by-piece with the magic wand) and put them on a new layer.

2. go back to the 'old' layer. Follow the dropdowns like this:

Image --> Adjust ---> Hue/Saturation.

3. you get a Hue/Saturation box. See the second dragger, the one that says Saturation? Drag it all the way to the left (minus 100). Colour information for that layer is now discarded.

Thanks, Smurf. I knew about the second link, but not the first.

Thanks to you also, Chris. After looking at a Photoshop book at Border's yesterday, I thought it was something like that. Thanks for the step by step though. I will give that a go.

This is great information for me also. Now lets see if I can fluck up my computer. :lol:

If I were you I would use the Pen tool to do the cutting - it is much more precise than the other tools => gives the image a smoother edge where you cut it. I find that the Wand tends to "pixelate" the edges too much, although it's great for "quick" cuts where precision doesn't matter.

Just my two cents ;)

yup gotta agree with ya there!
i tend to use the magic lasso thingy...rarely use the magic wand