Favorite Channel Mixer settings for B&W?
Glenn Sweet
Registered since 17th Oct 2002
Mon 14-Jul-03 10:31 AM
I'm somewhat new to Photoshop and I've been toying with the channel mixer to convert my D100 digitals to black and white. I have done a few different looks but I am curious to know what settings others are using... Also, any ideas on how to introduce a slight bluish tint to the overall image after conversion?
Glenn Sweet
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#2. "RE: Favorite Channel Mixer settings for B&W?" | In response to Reply # 0
Use another adjustment layer to create a tint (hue/saturation). Position this layer above the channel mixer layer once you've created a monochrome conversion you like. Save your file as a PSD so you can make changes without messing up the base color image.
There is no specific mixer formula that I can recommend except that you could start out with some of the Digtial Daan settings and then play (boldly) with the controls from there:
http://www.digidaan.nl/indexframedigidaan.html?channelmixer/index.html
I've found that some of the rules you'll get have to be broken at times. I use negative channel values and often don't have values that add up to 100 as you'll be advised. Just think in terms of your color image and what you want to do with it. If you want more contrast in green areas, boost the red channel relatively. Lower the red channel relatively to darken and add contrast to red areas. Blue skies can be darkened by lowering the relative level of the blue channel, watch it if you're raising blue levels since it's the noisiest of the three channels.
The notion that all channels need to add up to 100 falls apart when you start pushing an image harder. Watch your highlights and don't blow them out unless you want to, but you can certainly get aggressive with your adjustments if they work for your image.
Here's an image that has a red wall that I wanted to darken relative to the skulls. I used a channel mixer layer set to -20 red, +90 green, and +40 blue. This darkens the red wall, putting emphasis on the skull's tones. This mixer doesn't add up to 100, but the image works best (for my purposes) when I pushed the values beyond the suggested limit.
http://users.sisna.com/bjnicholls/salmon620.jpg
Here's the converted image (this isn't a greyscale jpeg, it's RGB):
Attachment#1 (jpg file)
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