B&W photo with a touch of color using PS Elements ~ a tutorial

I learned this technique years ago from a good friend of mine.

I’m not sure of the “technical” term for it, hence the title of this post.

I am working on a few short, but helpful tutorials for anyone who has or is thinking of purchasing Adobe Photoshop Elements.

I use my PSE ALL the time, especially for editing photos for my blog.

When I started using PSE back when, I remember being so confused trying to understand the program.

And the layer thing ~  well, that was a whole ‘nother thing!

I’m not an expert by any means, but I have learned a lot over the years and if I can do it,

YOU can too!

Plus, I’m a visual learner and welcome any tutorials I can find out there with pics.

Who knows, maybe you already know how to do this, and I’m just preaching to the choir,

but it’s all good.

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I love B&W photos and B&W photos with just a touch of color are SA-weet!

I especially LOVED this effect when I was scrap booking.

I’ve only digitally scrap booked and for me it was the only way to go.

I don’t anymore, but maybe someday I will again.

I have also used PSE for making invitations, our Christmas cards and lots of other things.

It’s very user friendly once you get the layer thing and it’s priced reasonably at about $100 or so.

Actually, I have to upgrade NOW ~ so many new and cool features on PSE 10!

Anyway, let’s get started shall we ??

Oh, before we do, just want to say that if you want to see any of the screenshots below larger, just click on them and they will show up in another window.

Okay….

STEP I

:: Select your image

This is mine.

Yup, she’s a cutie-pie, even with the snoogs and pepper tooth

So my goal for my photo is to keep Myah’s blue eyes and light pink bandana, the rest I want B&W.

STEP II

::  Drag your image into PSE

STEP III

::  Using the MAGNETIC LASSO TOOL (and shift key), carefully “lasso” around the outer edge of the object(s) you want to KEEP colored

{ IMPORTANT ~ when lassoing multiple objects in the same pic, you MUST hold the shift key when doing so, otherwise you will have to repeat this process and it can be very frustrating!  I just always hold the shift key down to prevent this }

(If you’ve selected your objects correctly, there will be a trailing dashed line highlighting them) 

STEP IV

::  Now, choose the SELECT tab and click on INVERSE

STEP V

::  Select the ENHANCE tab, then click the CONVERT TO BLACK AND WHITE

( You should see this split screen of the before and after images )

STEP VI

::  Click OK

And that’s it !!

That wasn’t so bad now was it ?!?

Now to tackle that pepper tooth!

The tool I am going to use for this is the CLONE STAMP.

Just adjust your stamp to the size you need ( shortcut ~ using the [ or ] key will resize your stamp easily ).

Use ALT & click simultaneously to select a selection of tooth that best matches the color and tone of the spot I want to clean up.

Start in small sections to make it look more natural.

You can also zoom your image at this point to be more precise.

Here is my AFTER picture of my Myah Jaye at age 2.5.

(she is 7 now)

Let me know how you made out if you use this tutorial, AND if there are any missing steps.

Happy editing!

Thought I would share a few scrap pages I made using this technique…

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