2.10.08 - Designer's Tiny Tool Kit & a Great Big Fat TUTORIAL!!!

Take that mean ladies! he he he! Ok, so my new goal is to be picked on, teased, bullied or bothered EVERY day so that I can write it all down to you INCREDIBLE ladies and you can send me some "atta boys" (the somewhat sexist quote that the army uses for a "pat on the back") You ladies ROCK! And your so darn funny too! I wish I could have emailed each and every one of you to thank you for the support individually, but time being what it is (limited and all) I'll just do it here!

THANK YOU!!!

So for the next few posts (time permitting) I'm going to offer some "Designer" items (fancy word for Black and White items! ha ha ha) and include some short and not so short TUTORIALS (am I yelling that word too loudly?? he he he). The tools, papers, overlays etc. will be perfect to try your hand out on some new techniques. And did I mention that I'll also be posting some Big 'ole TUTS to boot!?


Today's TUT will be another one on coloring elements. My last re-coloring TUT was for EASY to color elements (like the little heart doodle in your tool kit), solid elements that don't have any texture or design to them at all.

The NEXT easiest way to change the color of an element is to change the HUE/SATURATION of the element itself. If you are simply looking to make your element a "different" color, and not a "specific" color this is probably the best way to go. (does that make sense? - say you just want a lighter pink, or you want a red, then this way is good, but if you want a specific color to match another paper or element, you might want to try the technique below).

To use the HUE/SATURATION feature in PS you either go to IMAGE>ADJUSTMENTS>HUE/SATURATION or the shortcut is CTRL/Command+U (CTRL for PC users and Command for us Mac users). In PSE it's ENHANCE>ADJUST COLOR>ADJUST HUE/SATURATION and the same shortcut as PS (CTRL/Command+U)

This will bring up a window with 3 sliders HUE, SATURATION and LIGHTNESS (make sure that the preview box is selected to see your changes) now play with the sliders to come up with a new color...easy as pie!

NOTE! This will NOT work on black and white elements, ONLY on already colored elements.

Lastly (for today anyway) you can color your element a specific color by using two methods, the one I'll teach you today by using your COLOR REPLACEMENT TOOL tomorrow we'll talk about changing it with a Layer Style called a COLOR OVERLAY. Both of these techniques work best if the element you are re-coloring is a black and white element.

TO CHANGE YOUR ELMENT TO BLACK AND WHITE: in Photoshop Simply go to your menu at the top of the screen and click IMAGE>ADJUSTMENTS>BLACK AND WHITE. In Photoshop Elements try ENHANCE>ADJUST COLOR>REMOVE COLOR (I have only have 4.0 in Elements, so it might be a bit different in later versions) Please Note that if your element was originally...say a dark red... your new black and white image will be darker and closer to black than to white. If, however, your original element was a baby pink color, the new color will be lighter and closer to white. THIS IS IMPORTANT because if you take a very light/white element and try to re-color it say dark blue, it simply won't work, you'll just get a bright blue color (give it a shot and see what I mean! I've purposely included 3 different colored grey eyelets in the tool kit for you to try it out!)

So, does this mean that you have to have to keep light, medium and dark elements on hand to have all the colors that you might want? Nooooo silly goose! Photoshop lets you change them! In PS the trick to doing this is: IMAGE>ADJUSTMENT>BRIGHTNESS/CONTRAST (there is not automatic shortcut for this, but I use it a ton, so I've created one myself - that's a whole other tutorial! LOL) In PSE it's ENHANCE>ADJUST LIGHTING>BRIGHTNESS/CONTRAST. Once you've done this two sliders will appear and the default setting is right in the middle for both. If you want to make your element lighter you need to move the BRIGHTNESS slider to the right, darker...to the left. Now, I wasn't sure at first what the CONTRAST slider really did to help me, but if you use this technique enough you will! If you don't adjust the contrast as you make big changes in the Brightness, your element will "look funny" for lack of a better term. So if I'm making significant changes to my element's brightness, I always reduce (move the the left) my element's contrast. Play around with this feature and you'll soon get a feel for it.

Now, you can EITHER do this before OR after you have colored your element (I AM getting to that part, I promise! LOL) OR both! But to begin with just try to "guesstimate" a good match of grey for your color.

NOW this next part gave me fits FOREVER when I tried to learn it, so I'll try to break it down as best I can. If it doesn't work for you right away, just keep trying!

OK - in both PS and PSE you'll choose your COLOR REPLACEMENT TOOL you can find this tool in your BRUSHES Tool Flyout (the little tiny arrow next to your brush tool in the tools bar).

Once you have this tool ready you'll want to select the color that you want to change your element to. I usually use the EYEDROPPER TOOL (this is a hard one to find...lol... it's the tool that looks like any eyedropper in your tool bar) and then "sample" the color that I want to use - by sample I mean click on!. This will place your WANTED color in to the FOREGROUND color box at the bottom of your tool bar.

Now press X on your keyboard to move your Foreground/Wanted color to the bottom position.

Now you want to make sure that you have your Color Replacement Tool selected and move it over the grey element you want to change and ALT/Option+Click on your element (Alt being for PC users Option being for us Mac users!) This will "sample" the color of the grey element and place that color in what is NOW your Foreground color box. OK, so now in your foreground/background color box you have grey on top and your chosen color on the bottom.

NOW - IMPORTANT - (I always forgot this part and it ALWAYS messed me up! LOL) PRESS X on your keyboard (or click on the little tiny arrow thingy next to the two boxes of color) TO SWITCH THE GREY TO THE BACKGROUND (or bottom) COLOR. AND make sure that the layer that your element is on is ACTIVE (click on the layer to activate it) if it isn't active, or if another layer is active it won't work!

OK- it's easy from here... just take your Color Replacement Tool and "paint" on your new color over the grey element. If I've written this tutorial correctly and you've done the steps you should "magically" see the color appear in your element!

If it's not the exact color you want, no problem, simply finish coloring your element and then go back to the BRIGHTNESS/CONTRAST feature and lighten or darken your color as needed!

Can I just tell you that learning this technique gave me SUCH joy! LOL I hope it is a "lightbulb moment" for you as well! If you have questions, leave them in the Cbox on the left hand side of the blog, or email me at PineapplePlantation@gmail.com and I'll help out as best I can!

By the way...this technique not only helped me design some of my own stuff, but it helped my hard drive too! When I download another designer's kit now, or freebies, I generally only keep ONE of the elements that they offer in numerous colors and not the sometimes 5 or 6 that they put in the kits for easy use. It saves a TON of room on my computer and external hard drive!

This isn't really a "visual" technique so I haven't included screenshots, but if some of you need them, leave a comment and let me know, I can always update the post!!

Tomorrow's post - Adding a Color Overlay to your elements and the much requested How to use paper OVERLAYS! I'm cookin' up a few grungy overlays for y'all so come on back now ya hear! (he he he)

I know the freebie is not a lot, but download it ok? It makes me feel better when I have a lot of downoads!! (you can always delete it later right?) LOLOLOLOL!

Aloha my dear supportive friends!!

Shauna

Click HERE to download today's little tiny freebie!