Help, mouse painted image but.....

I have mouse painted flowers below that I have made.
I did what was in tutorial with channels from below.
I copy here what I did so someone can help me understand whats wrong and where I ran into problems this is from transparency faq. Posting it here because I didn't think anyone see.
This is getting embarrassing, I have went over and over different areas of channels,etc and I still can't get right but now I have black background.
I am using Adobe Photoshop CS version 8.0, no I can't upgrade to 3 but I do have also PSP 9 and Photoshop 6.

****areas is questions and where I am stumped******
u]Adobe Photoshop – Method 1[/u]


As mentioned above, this is my preferred method for new users to learn with.

1. On the Layers Palette turn off all layers except for the layer that has your bikini on it. (To turn a layer off, click the eyeball symbol to the left of its name.)
   *****
   didn't understand how to turn of layers. I didn't get why I didn't have layers except channel areas showing now I get that part but would it mess up the alpha?
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2. If the bikini layer has any white space around the bikini itself, use the eraser to get rid of the white space. It's very important at this stage that the bikini be on its own layer with nothing else on it.
   *****didn't see this I thought I was suppose to paint the background Black GRRR! but I had no white in texture.
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3. On the Layers Palette, ctrl-click the thumbnail for the layer with the bikini on it. (The thumbnail is the little picture of the layer directly to the left of the layer's name.) This will select everything on the layer. You should see the "marching ants" outlining your bikini now. If there are elements of the bikini on any other layers, hold down shift, and then ctrl-click their respective thumbnails to add them to the selection. Make sure not to include the background or any of the template layers.
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   I totally didn't get this part ants I couldn't seem to march all way around. Possibly forgot ctrl click? What in heck does ctrl click do?
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4. On the Layers Palette, click the tab that says Channels to switch it to the Channels Palette. What you should see listed here are the three primary channels for your image, labeled, "Red", "Green", & "Blue", and a master channel for the three, labeled "RGB". If you see any other channels besides those four, delte them now.
   ****
   I totally didn't get this part, did forum hide this but I had no other layers so I got this right word layers pallete for some reason really stumped me Is this any different section like main image, red, green and blue?
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5. In the lower right corner of the Palette Window, locate the button that looks like a square sticker being peeled from its backing. It's the second one from the right. It's immediately to the left of the one that looks like a trash can. It says "New Channel" when you hover your mouse over it. Click it.
   *****Now its say Pallete window is that the same I am looking at in layers channel?
   Did create new channel, it said Alpha
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6. You should now see a new channel called "Alpha 1", which is currently all black. Make sure all channels except for Alpha 1 are turned off and that Alpha 1 is turned on. This should have happened automatically when you created Alpha 1, but if it didn't, do it now.
   
   
7. Your canvas should now appear to be solid black with the exception that you should still be able to see the "marching ants" outline of your bikini. Paint everything inside the outline white and leave everything outside of it black.
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   I got this right finally or thought I did
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8. Click "Select" on the menu bar at the top of the screen to pull down the Select Menu. Click "Deselect" and you should see the marching ants disappear.
   ****
   I found it did it, one thing I got right
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9. On the Channels Palette, turn the red, green, & blue channels back on, and turn Alpha 1 off. Now click the tab that says layers to switch back to the Layers Palette. Create a new layer by pressing the same button you previously used to create the new channel. (Just as it created a new channel while you were on the Channels Palette, it will create a new layer while you're on the Layers Palette.) Click on the name of this new layer and drag it underneath the layer with the bikini on it. Paint the new layer 50% gray or darker; black is fine. (The gray/black layer will prevent the white halo sometimes caused when Alphas are created the way we just did it. If you don't know what I mean by that, don't worry about. Just make sure to always put a gray/black layer underneath your work and you'll never have to see that white halo. Alternatively, more advanced users may wish to use one of the better halo-elimination methods discussed in the FAQ.)
   *****
   I totally didn't understand this area. I didn't know what the person wanted
   thought how am I going to drag this layer behind flowers just didn't get it all.
   I am sitting there in front of program thing how am I going to put a layer behind this one when there is no layers I can drag. So I thought I have cut layer 3 and paint it some how
   but it wouldn't let me drag under it.
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10. Save your file as a 32-bit TGA and upload it to SL.

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I did this but image was now uploaded just black not transparent when I uploaded into
SL.
*****
I am really frusterated none of my inworld friends can help they use Gimp.
Flower image is mousepainted image I was trying to work on.
Image below is inworld.

FD, I thought you had had this nailed months ago. I'm glad you finally spoke up if you've been confused all this time. Let's see what we can do to get you straightened out.


To turn a layer on or off, click the little eyeball symbol to the left of the layer's name.


Sorry, I don't understand this part. Can you please re-explain with complete sentences?


Take things one step at a time. The point in this step is to put the subject of your image on its own layer, all by itself. This helps isolate the subject from the background.

Putting a black background behind the image comes in later. Cross that bridge when you come to it.

Take each step in order, one at a time, and you'll be fine.



"Marching ants" is the term for the dotted line that appears around things when you make a selection. It sounds like kind of a funny name. but if you've ever seen real ants encircle a piece of food, you can see where the name came from.

In any case, ctrl-clicking the thumbnail for a layer tells Photoshop you want to select everything on that layer. Try this as a demonstration example. Open up any image you like, any image at all. Make a new layer, and write your name on that layer with the paint brush. Now, on the Layers Palette, ctrl-click the thumbnail for the layer, and you'll see a dotted line ("marching ants" surrounding your name. This indicates that all the pixels that make up your name have been selected.



Sorry, I'm having trouble understanding you again. Please rewrite this part using complete sentences so that I can understand.

The one thing I might be getting out if this is maybe you're saying you don't know what the layers palette is. "Palettes" are what all the tabbed floater windows in Photoshop are called. The Layers Palette is the one that has all your layers listed on it. Its tab has the word "Layers" right on it. For more information on this, read the Workspace Overview section in your Photoshop Help file.


I don't know what you mean by "layers channel". Layers and channels are two separate things. There is a palette for each.


Good.


In the Layers Palette, you should see all your layers listed, one on top of the next. This list is called the "layer stack". If you click on the name of a layer and drag the mouse up or down, you can change the order of the stack. So, to put one layer "behind" another one, drag it down so that it's underneath the other one in the stack.

The only reason you wouldn't be able to drag a layer up or down in the stack is if it's a background layer. Background layers are easy to spot because they are always named "Background", and that name will be written in italics instead of the normal font. There can only be one background layer in an image. If you want to change a background layer to a normal layer, simply double click on its name. A dialog will pop up, asking you to rename the layer from "Background" to something else. Call it anything you want and click OK. You'll then be able to move the layer up or down, just like any other.


There are two reasons this could happen. The first would be if you saved as 24-bit instead of 32-bit. By definition, 24-bit images do not have alpha channels. So if you save as 24-bit instead of 32-bit, your alpha channel would have been erased.

The second reason would be if you made your alpha channel incorrectly. If you look at the alpha, it should look white in the shape of your flowers and black everywhere else. I'm guessing yours looks white everywhere, if it exists at all. You'll need to fix it.


Sorry to hear you're so frustrated. Hopefully we can get you straightened out.


Those images are way too small to tell what's going on in them. Can you please post bigger ones? And can you make sure the entire channels palette is visible? You've got the bottom cut off, which makes it impossible to tell whether you've got an alpha channel present, and if there is one, whether it was made properly.

Part of my problem is I am really ill lot of time and my brain is really fuzzy and its
bit difficult for me to explain the steps I do to create something or when things goes wrong.
Heck sometimes when things goes right with texturing I don't always know exactly how to describe it for someone. Like when I was able to successful at my first painting where I recreated a Cezanne image with just mouse and lot of shadowing.
This is bit embarrassing for me.
I can draw do some pretty cool things but some things definitely need more work on.
So I have been trying to texture whole city on my friends land with different ideas we have as challenge.
Been reviewing different processing, go through steps, over and over again.
Yet I am stuck there something I am not getting.
Been struggling with trying to figure out this one thing for last twelve hours and I am dead tired.
I don't even know how to enlarge image here it won't let me.
Here is the image I posted that I collaged on blog. http://bp1.blogger.com/_gQgTv9aF_Rc/RuruSWFA7XI/AAAAAAAAAKU/EqYEin-0zyU/s1600-h/problems+with+transparency.bmp

I let me sleep and then come back tonight re-read this post see if I can coherently explain what I keep running into and review your suggestions.
I see if I can get also bigger image with the tool bar too.
Quote:
Originally Posted by FD Spark
I didn't get why I didn't have layers except channel areas showing now I get that part but would it mess up the alpha?

posted by Choosen:

Sorry, I don't understand this part. Can you please re-explain with complete sentences?
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I didn't understand because when I think of layers I think of the other layer pallett and I kept going to layer part wonder why there was only one.
But I think I get each different part of the channel is also a layer.
I will re-read, re-try the steps again in 12 hours from now.

Ok I figured out how to upload bigger image.
I got this point but for some reason I got confused.
Do I deselect the rgb layers too?
I review later. One give it another try before I rested.
Included larger image of hand painted orginal flowers but didn't feel up to redoing them at the moment.

I finally figured out how to save png files that are transparent but still no go with tga.
I will retry and let you know my progress.
But I figured out save as web as png file works so much easier then tutorial here is image of the success. It did change image a bit though.
Darn want to share my first successful attempt at some type of transparent image via png files but isp went out for few hours.
Here it is: Not Tga but it will work for now.

I had a hard time too this is what i did

-i turn off any layers i'm not using and cause i'm absentminded save it again in case i make a tga out of it ^^
-i then click on a layer that is being used (not hidden) and hit ctrl - shift - e it will combine all the layers
-i then click on that one layer where the image is and choose select layer transparency
(you see the dotted lines all around the image where its transparent)
-I go up to the menu bar of photoshop and choose the selection menu and choose save selection and in the pop up window in the blank area just call it alpha (the radio button is automatically picked and it should be channel none of the other options are possible this has to be a PSD file though to do this)
-(now i check for the alpha channel) just click the channels panel and look it should be there
-then i choose select (at the top again) and deselect to make the dotten moving lines go away
- then i simply from the main menu under file select save as and choose tga and it saves with a transparent layer

It took me awhile but the explanation up top was giving me issues and i was always getting the black layer so i found a shorter explanatin and it worked for me (I was still learning photoshop so all the detail simply made it confusing and I needed a very mechanical step by step simple list .. now i know what's happening but didn't at first ^^)

I now am fancy and put a coloured layer behind it just before i save to get rid of any boarders but for now its not needed when learning. Those "white halos" although often I have none are removed that way but making a layer after making the alpha channel that is the same colour as the majority of the thing.

One of problems I was having is I could turn off the alpha layers but the rbg layers wouldn't totally turn off.
Also I didn't understand what I was reading I think, I thought it was ctrl, hift mouse key for some reason the "shift" part didn't hit me.
I haven't seen halos yet. I figured out how to do the png file that seems incredibly easier then I thought it would be...my friend told me about it just save as web select 24 first accidentally selected 8 and make sure tranparent was clicked.
Also sometimes I can't get the "marching ants" to select entire area I want but with saving as web it seems to understand that I want the transparent areas to remain transparent.
Also sometimes I get the grey area other times no.
I think lot of it is getting use to the program and being confused what does what for me.
Thanks for the hints.
Now if I can figure out how to keep my textures not becoming different once I shrink the size of a image to upload into the world.
Often I produce highly detailed mouse draw and collage related textures bigger then shrink and images change either the texture changes or it becomes squished and pixelated.
Also the colors change too especially with png files.
Anyone got hints for preventing this?

the ctrl shift e is a shortcut in photoshop ps2 (i have no earlier verson so i have no way to check) for - select all the layers that are showing and combine them all and make them one image

The marching ants not selecting everything you want to be transparent sounds like there are areas that look transparent to you but actualy have something filling them in

PNGS (i have no idea I should upload some but the colour should remain the same as i have made a ton of jpegs before I got photoshop when making things that didn't need a transparent layer and had that all work fine)

the squished and pixelated I have seen this before. I"m assuming its due to the pixel count you started with. Somene asked me to incorporate their logo into something. Their upload was fine but when I tried to incorporate into anything even the emailed file didn't work as it was all very blurry after a resize. This sounds to me like something is not being accounted for when they drew it. The image they emailed was blurry to start with as I asked them to email me a copy hoping what i got sent was much larger. The file was only about 500kb which said to me it probably was the reason very small file = not a whole lot of pixels to work with in my head.

Cool thing I have discovered about pngs is if you have transparent surface in whatever you make you don't have to go through all those steps all you need to do is save as web, make sure you got 24 and transparent selected.....save as, I keep pngs in their own folder.
Done instant transparent image.
Still can't figure out how to do TGA transparent still. I did use CTRL Shift and clicked orginal image in channels and I discoved it instant covers the marching ants all over.
Still no Tga alpha though but I can use png files. Its easier.
I did discover why my images are get distorted I am making them too big and then when I shrink them they loose orginal appearance.