Change black to different color in LR 2

[PhilH]

I shot some pictures of a subject against a black background. Because the subject was wearing a dark blue suit, I want to change the black background to a lighter color. Such as grayish-blue.

How the heck do I do this in LR2? I've used the adjustment brush a lot, but I can't "paint over" the black background and make it a different color. The background color remains black. I've messed with saturation and every other adjustment that seems like it might make sense. Nothing works. I'm missing something!

How can I do this with the adjustment brush...or with any other LR 2 tool?

[jdepould]

Lightroom doesn't work like that. You need PS or another pixel editor.

[PhilH]

What is it about Lightroom that doesn't let it work like that?

I've used Lightroom hundreds of times to quickly and easily change the a solid background of a different color to white or another color. Just Adjustment brush -> Color -> Paint over the background with Automask on. Fast and easy.

I realize that black is technically the absence of color, rather than being a color. Does it have something to do with that? Because...LR DOES "work like that" for other background colors."

Seems like I'm missing something rather obvious, but just saying that "Lightroom doesn't work like that" doesn't mean anything.


---------------------------------------------------------------------
jdepould wrote:
"Lightroom doesn't work like that. You need PS or another pixel editor."

[jdepould]

Sort of. It's basically just tinting whatever is underneath the brush. Black is too dark to actually see the tint.

Changing the color of a background is not a Lightroom job, it's a Photoshop job. Lightroom is a metadata editor, it can't change the pixels of an image, and changing the color of a background is a pixel-changing job.

[PhilH]

Thanks, Jamie. That makes sense!

I'll take the image into PS.