Re: problem-solving in PS

[Lea Murphy <lea@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Randy,

Thank you for this response.

I've played around with brush presets and their blend modes but I'll go back at them and explore deeper. I will also try doing this with a grey mask rather than black and see what that gives me. When I use a black mask I paint with white (or a shade (opacity) thereof).

The purpose of the masks is flexibility to undo or repaint differently. Maybe I should do away with the mask completely and paint on a dupe layer? Hmmm. I'll try that and see what I get.

Thanks for your speedy response that now has me thinking….

Lea

your kids . my camera . we'll click
www.leamurphy.com

On Jul 17, 2013, at 2:25 PM, Randy Little wrote:

I would have to see more of what you are doing but you might want to make brush present which should allow you to set brushes with blend modes.  Mask color is always a grey scale value.  black 100% transparent so you can't paint on that area. (you can but you won't see it.)  Unfortunity photoshop is about 20 years behind the times in basic painting in more highend apps you can paint with RGBA with more control then Photoshop allows.   So What are you using the mask for in relationship to your dodge burn methodology.     

Randy S. Little
http://www.rslittle.com/

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm2325729/

On Wed, Jul 17, 2013 at 12:01 PM, Lea Murphy <lea@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

I'm wondering if someone can help me trouble shoot an action I'm trying to create.

Background:

My goal is to make a more efficient workflow when I do black and white conversions on images.

I use an action in PSCS3 to convert images from color to bw. It creates several adjustment layers that I can turn off or adjust as needed.

I add two additional layers by copying the background layer and making one layer screen mode and one layer multiply mode. Then I use a normal mode brush and paint, varying my opacity, to dodge and burn as needed.

What I'd like to do is get the dodge/burn capabilities on one normal mode layer and change my brush back and forth from screen to multiply as I do my work.

This would create a smaller file (one less background layer) and would allow me to switch from dodge to burn on the fly using quick keys on my Wacom tablet.

The actions I've created and tried to use to achieve my goals are not working.

My questions are:

Can someone see where I'm going wrong?

Is it possible to screen and multiply on the same layer by switching my brush preset back and forth OR does the layer itself have to be set to screen or multiply?

Does my mask color matter? I'm using black but maybe that's not right.

Many thanks for any help you might offer.

Lea

your kids . my camera . we'll click
www.leamurphy.com