A little more Photoshop help??

[N_Jay]

OK< so now I can adjust the color of a filled area just fine.

How do I (or can I) remove one color, or replace it with transparent?

Example, I have a map with a lot of white or grey background and a colored area.

I need to stack a few of these maps as if I am staking real transparencies.

Right now the white (even with the layer set to 50% transparent) washes out the color of the underlying layers.

HELP!!!!!

[PaulV7]

Yes you can do this.

Open 1 of the maps and look at the layer editor. If you only have 1 layer or the white is on the same layer as the color this is what you do.

Select the white area with the magic wand tool. Hit delete. You should see gray and white checkered boxes (assuming photoshop is setup in default) The checkered boxes are to tell you nothing is there.

If you already have a file with them all as separate layers you can still do this. Just select the layer you want and use the magic wand tool on the white area and hit delete.

The white/gray checkers will not print btw. They are only a place holder to show you that the space is transparent or empty.

Now depending on how you want the colors of the map to interact you can change this. So you can make them interact like mixing pigment (paint) or light, or other such effects. In the layer window there is a pull down that says "Normal." Pull this down and you will see a list of all kinds of ways to overlap layers. If I remember correctly you will want "Overlay" if you want a true transparency effect. You will need to setup each layer with the effect you want.

Paul

[N_Jay]

Originally posted by PaulV7
Yes you can do this.

Open 1 of the maps and look at the layer editor. If you only have 1 layer or the white is on the same layer as the color this is what you do.

Select the white area with the magic wand tool. Hit delete. You should see gray and white checkered boxes (assuming photoshop is setup in default) The checkered boxes are to tell you nothing is there.

If you already have a file with them all as separate layers you can still do this. Just select the layer you want and use the magic wand tool on the white area and hit delete.

The white/gray checkers will not print btw. They are only a place holder to show you that the space is transparent or empty.

Now depending on how you want the colors of the map to interact you can change this. So you can make them interact like mixing pigment (paint) or light, or other such effects. In the layer window there is a pull down that says "Normal." Pull this down and you will see a list of all kinds of ways to overlap layers. If I remember correctly you will want "Overlay" if you want a true transparency effect. You will need to setup each layer with the effect you want.

Paul

Thanks.

This program was NOT written for engineers!!

[ramirami]

Originally posted by N_Jay


Thanks.

This program was NOT written for engineers!!

or it was designed by Engineers

[N_Jay]

Originally posted by ramirami


or it was designed by Engineers

No way.

Well maybe, but they would have to be MAC engineers!

[PaulV7]

Adobe always does things that seem backwards. The only saving grace is that once you learn 1 of Adobe's programs menu sets you can get around about any of their programs pretty easy Photoshop, After Effects, Premiere, Illustrator.

Plus photoshop is such a vast program once you really dive into it that things that seem weird at first make a lot of since later on. And eventually you just use all the hot-keys and don't mess with the menu any more.

With any art program you run into the designed for artists or the engineer. Look at any 3d program they are MUCH worse than photoshop. The artist wants things set 1 way and an engineer would want it totally different. That is why most 3d programs have very customizable menus and hot-keys.

[N_Jay]

Well I will not be using it enough to get to using the hot keys.

I just need to take a bunch of computer generated maps and overlay them without the whole stack becoming unreadable.

I have it about 99% of the way there. I am trying to find which of the overlay modes works best.