Mono with a touch of colour

[fwibble]

Hi I'm new to the forum, I've searched google on how to edit a colour image to a mono image with a touch of colour and all i can find is to do this:

open your image.
Desaturate the image.
and then with the history brush restore the areas where you would like colour.

what i'm hoping to find out, is there any filter or adjustment that can turn an image to mono but leaving 1 colour as it is, without having to do it the history brush method.

Thanks in advance

[tombothetominator]

You can go to the select menu - 'color range'. Then select the color you want to keep - adjust fuzziness as necessary and hit ok.

This will select JUST that color, so invert this selection (select - invert, or CTRL+I), then desaturate however you like (CTRL+SHIFT+U is the quickest method, but doesnt allow for much control. Creating a monochrome channel mixer adjustment layer is a much better way to do it IMHO)

[fwibble]

I'm not a n00b to photoshop however can you explain how to create the monochrome cannel mixer... your selection method worked brilliantly thanks btw

[tombothetominator]

To create a monochrome channel mixer:

- first create a channel mixer adjustment layer (you can do this by going to 'menu - new adjusment layer - channel mixer'.

- Then check the box that says 'monochrome'

- by default it takes the red and sets it at 100%. What this means is that anything that is pure red in the image is now white.

- now what you can do is adjust all the sliders to get the balance and contrast that you are looking for.

- keep in mind that in a lot of images, the blue channel contains the most noise, so sliding this channel up to high in channel mixer can cause un-necessary noise

[fwibble]

thanks again

[tombothetominator]

no problemo. glad to help.