Halo Probs

Hello

i tried to produce a tattoo and have that halo thing around it. So i watched in the forum and took the tutorial of robin (the quicktime movie) and followed it step by step. Well but it didn't work. When i want to save the tga the option for "alpha channels" is grey and can't be checked. I tried it in PS 7.0.1 and CS, but it didn't work.

Can someone tell my what might be the mistake i do? Maybe it needs a special mode? (I worked with RGB) Or something else i might have forgotten?

Would be lovely if someone can help me

Greetings
Chan

Make sure your alpha channel is selected as visible before you save. And don't flatten image, that will make you loose your channels. Lastly, make sure you are saving as TGA file (32 bit)

Did you try the Faming Pear filter? At Robin's there is a download for it. After you have made the alpha channel and before you save your item you need to use the filter. That prevents you of getting the halo.

Have fun,
*AE*

Incorrect. Turning channels on and off is strictly an illusion of the GUI. It doesn't affect how the image saves at all. If a channel is present, it is part of the image, no matter what. You could turn visibility off for the alpha, or for any of the color channels, or even all three color channels at once, and it won't make any difference whatsoever to how your TGA turns out.



Also incorrect. Flattening will in no way destroy any channels. I don't recommend flattening anyway, as it yields zero benefit and it makes it harder to make changes later if you need to, but it won't hurt your channels. Flattening is a function of layers, not channels, and as I keep reminding people over and over and over again in this forum, layers and channels are entirely different things.




There only two reason I can think of off hand for why this would happen. One would be if you're working in the wrong mode, which it sounds like you're not, but we'll address that anyway in a minute. The second would be if you did not actually put an alpha channel into the image, which we'll address first.

Take a look at your Channels palette. How many channels does it show? If you did everything right, you should see the following:

1. At the top, there will be a master controller for the three color channels called RGB.

2. Below that, you'll see the three color channels themselves, individually labeled Red, Green, and Blue.

3. Below the color channels, you should see an additional channel called Alpha 1. (It could have a different name if you chose to call it something else, but the default name is Alpha 1. Whatever it's called though, that's your alpha channel.)

Do you see all those things? From what you're saying, I'd be willing to be that Alpha 1 is not there, and that you somehow skipped the step of creating it.

If it is there, then we can explore other possibilities, but I'd be very surprised if that turns out to be the case. Can you post a screenshot of your Channels palette so I can see what's going on with it?



The mode settings you want are RGB, 8 bits per channel. Here's what would happen if you were working in other modes:

1. If you're working in Indexed Color, Grayscale, or Duotone mode, that will cause the alpha channel checkbox to begrayed out.

2. If you're working in CMYK, Lab Color, or Multichannel mode, that will prevent you from being able to save to TGA at all.

3. If you're workig in Bitmap mode, your image will have only one channel, and you won't be able to create more. (And you won't be able to save to TGA)

Since you said you're working in RGB, it doesn't sound like any of those three things are your problem. But since you asked, I figured I'd explain.

Heya,

first thanks for all the answers, now we are going on to solve the prob )



1. yep
2. yep
3.yep and no skip



Sure, it's attached. I also attached the Layers and one to be sure i'm in the right mode.

Thanks so far
~Chan

I tried again, this time with activated Alpha map but didn't change anything. Still Alpha Channels are unable to check and gray when i wanna save.

Am i understanding it right, that when you hit save, and the targa options box pops up, those are greyed out? Or does it not pop up at all after you hit save?

When i go to "save as" and change the file extension to ".tga" i cannot say my programm so save alpha channels with the image, like seen on the screenshot on the last post.

And for sure when i wanna upload the image then the part that *should* be transparent with the alphachannel isn't transparent.

Heya,

ok i have PS 7 but i don't remember that i installed an alpha plugin. I'll take a look and answer then again.

Chan

okay i found a "Wizard for exporting transparent images" by Tom Ruark. I don't know if that is the one you mean. But for the case it is i'll reinstall Photoshop without it later and take a look if it works then.

Hi Chandni!

If you're using PS 7.0, that's your problem, right there.

The people at Adobe tried an experiment with PS 7.0, and used a different way to implement Alpha Channels with .tga files. It didn't work, to put it mildly. It was incompatible with many other programs, and caused a huge uproar in the community. So they pulled it and put up a patch to make the .tga alphas work they way they always had, and still do, within a matter of weeks.

If you're using PS 7.0, you need to upgrade your app to PS 7.0.1

You can find the non-English language versions for the PC at
http://www.adobe.com/support/downloads/product.jsp?product=39&platform=Windows

and for the Mac at
http://www.adobe.com/support/downloads/product.jsp?product=39&platform=Macintosh

In both cases, it's pretty far down the page, so just scroll until you find it.

For any of you who are reading this with an English version of PS 7.0, your PC site is
http://www.adobe.com/support/downloads/detail.jsp?ftpID=1851

and your Mac site is
http://www.adobe.com/support/downloads/detail.jsp?ftpID=1852

To recap; there are several reasons for a Targa (.tga) alpha to fail. The most common are;

1. More than one Alpha Channel, or no Alpha Channel. (It's like the Highlander; there can be only one.)

2. Wrong color mode. (You need to be working in RGB 8 bit)

3. PS 7.0

If all of this is just too much for you, and you just want to make your design, upload it, and not worry about alpha channels or anything else, then use the .png format, not .tga.

Personally, I prefer the power and flexibility of a real Alpha Channel; but that's me. Your tastes might differ.

(Oh, and Chandni, in the screen shot I noticed that the layer below your tattoo is still transparent. If you want to make sure that there's no halo, make that layer solid black, or whatever color the tattoo is. The Alpha Channel will take care of placing the transparency where it needs to be. The image itself can easily be a solid color )

(You can even make it all white, and use the Tint box in SL to make the solid color tattoo any color you want it to be. That takes care of any hint of halo, too! )

Heya,

i already upgraded to 7.0.1 some days ago when i read about probs with the 7.0 in this forum. I tried that action from Robin to create alpha channel but well ok that did the same like me before without the action

So i think that i have a very uncommon reason that the alpha saving fails when every common reason isn't the reason

About tbe black layer... i didn't have a solid black layer but a black edge around the tattoo, not too much but enough for the alpha channel to cut the black off like in the Tutorial of Robin (in that quicktime movie) there have not been the complete layer in the color of the 'object' only a big edge around it. Let me upload a test file, so we can take a look

Btw i tried it with CS2 too, but same result/problem.

Hi Chandni!

Whatever is wrong, it's not your file. I just tried it, and had no problem at all making a 32 bit .tga with it. (Do you want a copy?)

At this point, I would either re-install PS (you were going to do that, did you?) or check the Adobe support and find out if there is something that is known to conflict with PS, that you are also running.

Or just give up on the .tga format, and use .png instead, at least until you can figure out what is really going on with things.

Sorry that I can't do more; but I'm stumped.

That makes two of us.

Heya,

didn't have the time now for a reinstall (you know that when you want to do that and then comes something keeping you busy? ) but i tried to save with PNG, same error like with the tga, no alpha maps possible. It seems that is must be my PS copy. As soon i make it i will reinstall and let you know

Thanks for all the help
Chandni

Finally i found the time to reinstall P7.

It seems that the prob is somewhere on my system, because even the install didn't help anything, i still cannot save the alpha channels with tga or png. Well anyhow, thank you all for your advices and help, you did your best

Greetings
Chan

After installing it, did you then immediately upgrade it to 7.0.1? If you left it at plain old 7.0, then that's why you can't save alpha channels.

I had it installed before reinstalling but didn't change anything. Now i try to install it but it tells me that it does not find my photoshop although it is installed... *sighs*