Photoshop Elements 5: The Missing Manual

Chapter 10: Removing and Adding Color 275

Creating Spot Color

The black mask view shows only the mask itself, not your photo beneath it. This is

a good choice when you’re checking to see how clean the edges of your selection

are. If you’re adding or subtracting areas of your photo, then choose the red over-

lay view so that you can see the objects in your photo as you paint over them. You

can use the method described above to paint in either view.

That’s all there is to it, but that’s not all you can do to edit a layer mask. You can

use shades of gray to adjust the transparency of the mask. When you paint on your

mask with gray, you can change the opacity of the changes made by the Adjust-

ment layer. You can let a little color show through the mask, for instance, without

letting the full vividness of the color come through. Figure 10-5 shows an example

of how you’d use this technique.

The lighter the shade of gray you choose, the more color shows through.

Figure 10-4:

Elements not only lets you edit your layer mask, but

gives you two different ways to see it.

Top: To see the masked area in black, Alt+click the

right thumbnail for the layer in the Layers palette.

Bottom: To see the masked area in red, Alt+Shift+click

the layer’s thumbnail.

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