Joel Tjintjelaar

There seems to be a lot of interest in black and white images in which certain parts are colored. This is called “selective coloring”. It’s an interesting technique, which you either love or hate. There are some black and white purists that absolutely can’t stand those sort of images. I’m not here to judge, you can decide for yourself if you like it or not but I have used it so now and then but it is very unlikely I will use it a lot since I prefer pure monochromatic images. Either way, it’s always nice to try out some new techniques and be creative. So, let’s get started and bring some color in your black and white images.

Adjustment Layers

The first step is to convert your color image to a black and white image. There are several ways to do this as I have explained in other tutorials. For this tutorial I’m just going to use the Black & White tool.

Go to > Layers Pallet > Fill or Adjustment Layer > Black & White

This will open the Black and White dialog box, which is the exact same tool as can be found under Image à Adjustments à Black & White. Move the sliders until you think the image looks good and press ok.

Why are we using an Adjustment Layer? Because it will save you some time. It automatically creates a new layer and it also creates a mask, which you need for the selective coloring.

Let’s took a look at the more time consuming way.

1. Make a copy of the background layer.
2. Convert to black and white.
3. Add a layer mask.

There are three steps in this process, while the Adjustment Layers only takes one click.

Using the layer mask

— Layers

First, make sure the layer mask is selected. The Layer Mask is on the top layer, left click on the right, white square. Now we are working in the mask.

Now that you are in the mask itself, select a black brush. If you now paint over any part of the image, it will reveal the image that is underneath the mask. In other words: you will bring back the color.

There is always a chance that you accidently paint over parts that you would like to stay in black and white. Or maybe you just missed a spot.

— Mask Overlay

As you can see, I painted a bit too rough. I just wanted the red of the rose to become visible. Instead I accidently painted over the background and over the green parts. To undo this, simply take a white brush and paint over those parts that you wish to hide again.

Chances are you missed a spot. The best way to find out if you did is to hold the alt key and left click on the mask. This will reveal the mask and you will exactly see what you painted.

— Layer mask1

As you can see there are some white spots in the rose: I didn’t do a good paint job. Just select a black paint brush and paint over those white spots. To go back to your image just alt click again on the mask.

Final thoughts

Bringing back color in black and white images isn’t that hard with Photoshop. You just need to ask yourself the question if you like this technique. I’d say: just try it out. It’s always good to try out different techniques and be creative. You might get a result that you weren’t suspecting.