Selective Coloring

[eaglesfan]

So i took some pictures of our apple bush and thought it would be a good time to try my hand at selective coloring. Now the software i used was on Photobucket, so I didn'y expect it to come out great. Here are the pics:

BEFORE


AFTER


Now here's what I did:
Duplicated starting image
Turned one of the images to grayscale.
Went to the other picture, turned up saturation.
Smoothed out the spot on the upper/left side apple.
Used the "Smart Scissors" tool to cut out the apples on the color picture.
Dragged the colored apples over the grayscale image.
Used the "Smart Recolor" tool to tint the one leaf in the middle of the apples grey.

Is that the easiest way to do it? Did I do an OK job? (I know there are mistakes)

Any other advice would be greatly appreciated. thanks!

-EF

[BEGM83]

Using photoshop elements i tend to:

Do all editing on original photo such as cropping, contrast etc etc
Create a new layer and drop the saturation to zero
Use the eraser and 'rub out' the parts i want the colour to show through.

Here's a couple i did.



With the poppy i brought back a bit of the original background colour in too to give it a washed out feel



And again with that the stark contrast is what i like most.

Its great fun to do and i can spend an absolute age on just one photo! It's shameful

[junglebear]

I just discovered this this morning, it is great fun!
I did it the same way as you more or less, but instead of dragging I add an alpha channel to the grayscale layer (which should be on top), select the bit I want coloured (Apples eg) with scissors, then simply press 'delete'. This seems easier to me

[windrider86]

Originally Posted by junglebear

I just discovered this this morning, it is great fun!
I did it the same way as you more or less, but instead of dragging I add an alpha channel to the grayscale layer (which should be on top), select the bit I want coloured (Apples eg) with scissors, then simply press 'delete'. This seems easier to me

I havent tried doing it that way yet. Thanks for the tip

[fotoshooter]

I like the full color one personally...wonderful exposure