Editing product photo to make it transparant?

F
Posted By
furman
Apr 26, 2005
Views
180
Replies
5
Status
Closed
Hi,
I am new to image editing. I am using Illustragor CS 11 and also Photoshop current release demo.

I have some images of products which I took with a digital camera. I wamt to edit out the background and just leave the product with its outline so I can then transfer it to another plain colour background or just leave it as it is as it will probably go onto a white page website.

I have read somewhere there is a way to fill the background with an obscure colour and then automatically remove that colour from the picture which will just leave the image, not sure if its right though. I would really appreciate some advice on this.

Thanks

Master Retouching Hair

Learn how to rescue details, remove flyaways, add volume, and enhance the definition of hair in any photo. We break down every tool and technique in Photoshop to get picture-perfect hair, every time.

S
SCRUFF
Apr 26, 2005
Select all, then copy and paste the original pic into a new item and select "transparent background when you do"

"furman" wrote in message
Hi,
I am new to image editing. I am using Illustragor CS 11 and also Photoshop current release demo.

I have some images of products which I took with a digital camera. I wamt to edit out the background and just leave the product with its outline so I can then transfer it to another plain colour background or just leave it as it is as it will probably go onto a white page website.

I have read somewhere there is a way to fill the background with an obscure colour and then automatically remove that colour from the picture which will just leave the image, not sure if its right though. I would really appreciate some advice on this.

Thanks
T
Tacit
Apr 26, 2005
In article ,
"furman" wrote:

I have some images of products which I took with a digital camera. I wamt to edit out the background and just leave the product with its outline so I can then transfer it to another plain colour background or just leave it as it is as it will probably go onto a white page website.

Best place to start:layer masks.

Open your Layers palette. You will see one layer, called "background." Double-click the background layer to turn it into a real layer.

Make a selection of the object. The best way to do this depends on what it is; you may use the Lasso tool, the Marquee tool, the Pen tool, or any of a number of other techniques.

When you have the object selected, use Select->Save Selection and choose Layer Mask in the Save Selection dialog.

I have read somewhere there is a way to fill the background with an obscure colour and then automatically remove that colour from the picture which will just leave the image, not sure if its right though. I would really appreciate some advice on this.

That works only for GIF images, and used to be the way it was done back around 1992 or so. Today, once you have the image on a transparent background, you use the Save for Web command to save a Web image that is transparent.

One thing you should consider, though, is that only GIF images can have transparent backgrounds on the Web, and GIF images are limited to only 256 discrete colors, making them inappropriate for most photographic images. JPEG images can have a full range of color, but JPEG does not permit transparency. PNG can have a full range of color and supports transparency, but most Web browsers, including Internet Explorer for Windows, don’t show the transparency.

So you’re usually best off creating a new background that is the same color as your Web page, and saving the photograph as a JPEG.


Art, photography, shareware, polyamory, literature, kink: all at http://www.xeromag.com/franklin.html
T
Tacit
Apr 26, 2005
In article <cca88$426e3c8f$42a1c081$>,
"Scruff" wrote:

Select all, then copy and paste the original pic into a new item and select "transparent background when you do"

That’s unnecessary; simply going to the Layers palette and double-clicking the word "background" accomplishes the same result.


Art, photography, shareware, polyamory, literature, kink: all at http://www.xeromag.com/franklin.html
F
Furman
Apr 26, 2005
Thanks for the replies, I’ll be trying it this evening.

"tacit" wrote in message
In article ,
"furman" wrote:

I have some images of products which I took with a digital camera. I wamt to edit out the background and just leave the product with its outline so I can then transfer it to another plain colour background or just leave it as it is as it will probably go onto a white page website.

Best place to start:layer masks.

Open your Layers palette. You will see one layer, called "background." Double-click the background layer to turn it into a real layer.
Make a selection of the object. The best way to do this depends on what it is; you may use the Lasso tool, the Marquee tool, the Pen tool, or any of a number of other techniques.

When you have the object selected, use Select->Save Selection and choose Layer Mask in the Save Selection dialog.

I have read somewhere there is a way to fill the background with an obscure colour and then automatically remove that colour from the picture which will just leave the image, not sure if its right though. I would really appreciate some advice on this.

That works only for GIF images, and used to be the way it was done back around 1992 or so. Today, once you have the image on a transparent background, you use the Save for Web command to save a Web image that is transparent.

One thing you should consider, though, is that only GIF images can have transparent backgrounds on the Web, and GIF images are limited to only 256 discrete colors, making them inappropriate for most photographic images. JPEG images can have a full range of color, but JPEG does not permit transparency. PNG can have a full range of color and supports transparency, but most Web browsers, including Internet Explorer for Windows, don’t show the transparency.

So you’re usually best off creating a new background that is the same color as your Web page, and saving the photograph as a JPEG.

Art, photography, shareware, polyamory, literature, kink: all at http://www.xeromag.com/franklin.html
F
furman
May 7, 2005
Hi,
Thanks, I tried it today and it works 🙂

How to Improve Photoshop Performance

Learn how to optimize Photoshop for maximum speed, troubleshoot common issues, and keep your projects organized so that you can work faster than ever before!

Related Discussion Topics

Nice and short text about related topics in discussion sections