3. Start making channels!
-
"So what is a channel?" you
might ask. Channels are sections of your picture that you have marked
as pre-selected. Each channel can be defined for a different place
(arms, hair, clothes, etc...), and when you want to work on that one place
without affecting any other parts of the picture, you just activate the
channel and that portion of the body will be selected and ready.
Here's how it's done...
-
Within a section of the body
you plan on coloring, take the Magic Wand tool and click (make sure its
tolernace is set for 1 pixel in the oprions window and no more!).
Little dots will appear within the selected part -- these dots are called
"marching ants". By holding down the <shift> key as you click,
you can select multiple parts at once.
-
When you have a section selected
and ready, go to Window --> Show Channels and a little window will pop
up. At the top of the window are four bars (RGB, red, green, and
blue) and at the base of the window are four small buttons (load channel
as selection, save selection as channel, create new channel, and delete
channel) : you will click on "new channel". A small bar with a #4
will pop on, all black with your marching ants still visible. You
will want to fill that part with white, so type <ctrl>-i to invert the
black to white.
-
You now have a channel!
You can double clcik your mouse on the #4 and a window will appear which
allows you to change to channel name : I recommend you do so (call it skin,
eyes, whatever) since it's hard to remember what numbers represent which
channels. Hit "OK" when done.
-
To make another channel,
type <ctrl>-d to deselect your parts, then click on RGB at the top of
the channel window and your full picture will appear again. You can
repeat Step 3 again as many times as you need for as many body parts as
you have to color and/or want seperated from everything else.
-
Look at my examples at the
right to see how I broke my picture up.
-
Always make sure you have
a channel for behind the character so you can import your background later,
and make a channel with your character's outlines for later use, too!
To select all the black at once, select any black part with the magic wand,
then go to Select --> Similar and it will select all the colors you've
currently got selected, in this case just the black from the lines.
-
SAVE again (remember to do
this frequently)!!! Nothing stinks more than a crash just after you
got all your channels set up!
NOTE!
If you're making selections
and you notice some parts of your selection are seeping out into spots
you don't want, then one of the lines is broken somewhere. Check
the lines carefully and if you find a hole in the lines somewhere patch
it with the pencil.
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The parts of her skin
with the dotted lines are selected.
You can create channels
with these selected parts and
bring this selected portion
back up any time you want.
An example of a channel;
in this case, it's a channel
of the outlines of her
body.
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![[Finished Artwork]](laracroft.jpg){kind=link}