Wednesday, May 27, 2009

CoffeeShop Selective Color PS/PSE Action!


Here is the newest free CoffeeShop action, CoffeeShop Selective Color. I already have a selective color action which just leaves the blue in the image (CoffeeShop Denim), but people have requested an action that would work on other colors. So I wrote this little action for you guys! It turns your image B&W and then opens a levels adjustment layer so that you can tweak your B&W contrast to taste. Then the action applies an automatic vignette (you can turn this off after the action runs, or change the blending mode to multiply or soft light, or even adjust its opacity). Finally the action selects your brush tool and then clicks to select the B&W layer mask. Adjust your brush's opacity and softness to taste and simply paint over areas you want color, and then flatten your image. This action also works great if you want a nice B&W conversion.

There is much "controversy" over selective color and some photographers will tell you it is outdated and overused (where they found this information I am not sure, perhaps Wikipedia under "How to be Too Cool for School, or How to Come off as a Real Professional Photographer Who Knows it All"?). ;-) I have found personally that many many people ("people" as in regular people who don't agonize every minute about aperture and film speed and lighting and eye pops and worry more about capturing a moment) out there completely love this effect and will specially request it, especially in children and wedding photography editing.

I love to use Selective Color in some of my images, such as the baby photo above, but I will be the first to tell you I never worry about what is "cool", but follow my own path which often leads through the bug and snake-infested weeds directly to a barbed-wire fence covered in prickly blackberry vines. When color film first came out I imagine everyone thought B&W was outdated too... ;-)

I always tell people photography is art and art is subjective and what is trendy today might not be tomorrow, so just have fun and create what YOU like! Now I am stepping off my soap box so that I can enjoy a nice cup of coffee while my boys nap and dream about having a cool Mom who will feed them unlimited Ding Dongs and let them drink Cherry Kool-Aid on the carpet while playing video games and cuddling with their pet boa constrictor.

Download the CoffeeShop Selective Color PS/PSE Action HERE!

Do you want to download thousands of professional CoffeeShop PSE/Photoshop actions (including exclusive ones not found anywhere for free), textures/overlays, scrapbooking papers, clip art/design elements, photo storyboards and frames, and Lightroom presets from this site in one convenient zipped file AND help support this one-woman blog?

Just click here for my CoffeeShop Mega Download Pack!

35 comments:

  1. Thank you so much for this Freebie. I want to let you know that I posted a link to your blog in Creative Busy Hands Scrapbook Freebies Search List, under the Photoshop/Gimp Resource(s) (Brush(es), Swatch/Palette, ...) post on May. 27, 2009. Thanks again.

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  2. I agree - Photography is about an individual taste. Some people like what I do, some don't. I really don't care! LOL

    As long as I do, isn't that all that matters?

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  3. I LOVE THIS feature!!!!!!!!!! :) I send you a pix of what i've done. Not sure if you had a chance tos ee it yet :) many thanks.

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  4. you know, I have detected that sort of opinion out there a lot, and honestly, my clients go nuts over the selective color technique. If that's what they want, then who is out there saying it's not cool?

    Love your actions so much. I use them all the time. Thank you for all the time you've put into them!

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  5. thanks Rita!! I personally like this look-cool or not, dated or outdated ; )

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  6. You are a funny chick! I like your style:) I, too, consider photography to be an art. Art is up to the artist, don't you think? Did Frida Kahlo care what others thought about her work? No, not really. ;) Thanks for the action. It's WAY cool!

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  7. Thanks so much for the Action! You truley have some of the BEST!

    I wanted to add to you that you just crack me up! You posts are so "real" and funny!

    Thanks for eveything!

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  8. Thank you! Your blog post will be advertised on the DigiFree Digital Scrapbooking Freebie search engine today (look for timestamp: 27 May [LA 07:00pm, NY 09:00pm] - 28 May [UK 02:00am, OZ 12:00pm] ).

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  9. A great action! Thanks for posting it, and for all the time you spend helping other photographers!

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  10. very nice, can't wait to try it.

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  11. Yay, so glad you didn't conform and thank you for sharing with us.

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  12. Thanks for the great action. Can't wait to play with it!

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  13. Thanks again!!! Fun stuff. Why some things have to be do's and don'ts when it comes to artistic expression, I have no idea. If people like it, then work with it!! If others don't, then don't include it in your work.

    Great job for offering such wonderful items for people to expound their own style. And, I am loving all the adjustments that I can make on these.

    And we miss you on 2peas!

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  14. It's great. Thanks so much:)

    MiKiko

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  15. Thank you so much, this is so cool!
    Greetings from france

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  16. Thank you so much for this freebie! I have sent a ton of people to your blog, may you have much more success!

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  17. Thank you so much! This is great!

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  18. oh this looks like fun! I can't wait to try it out! Thank you

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  19. Thanks again Rita! I love your blog, I love your actions, and I love how you speak your mind. I agree completely with you on the selective color issue - and that we need to follow our own artistic path. I love your denim action and can't wait to try this one.

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  20. I couldn't agree more about capturing the moment. By the time you have messed around with all the settings, the moment can be gone. Thank you for the download.

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  21. Thank you for all your wonderful actions and templates. Your creative ability is amazing! Once again, thank you for all that you so freely share with us.

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  22. Thank you!
    Thank you!
    Thank you!

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  23. Thank you for all of your actions. Your generousity is greatly appreciated. Thank you for sharing your wonderful talent.

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  24. Rita, I love this action! Thanks for all the time you put into educating others:)

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  25. I am new to actions and I am having problems with the Selective Color Action. I have installed, but there is no icon on the display button. The action does run and it does select a brush but I cannot paint to reveal the underlying color. I am on the B&W Layer Mask (which is white) and I have black as my foreground color. What is my problem? Txs so much for your help.

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  26. I am new to PSE ...can't wait to learn it enough to use these wonderful actions...may God bless you abundantly for your generosity.

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  27. Thank you very much for your wonderful contributions to this art!

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  28. Hi Rita - I tried running this action on PSE 9, but I got an error that said this file wasn't compatible with version 9. Will you be updating the action so it runs on PSE 9? Very excited to use it! Thanks!

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  29. Hi Rita, I am thankful to you for letting us grab free actions! May the good Lord bless you heart..

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  30. Just downloaded and used this action. Really effective. Many Thanks.

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  31. I can't seem to get this action to download. Anytime I click on it it says "Firefox can't establish a connection to the server at download1618.mediafire.com." I haven't had a problem with any of the actions so I'm wondering if the link is broken? Thank you SO much for all that you do! These actions you post have made my job SO much easier!

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  32. Jennifer, thank you so much for commenting on the broken link! I just replaced it, so if you have any other problems let me know. :-)

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  33. I discovered your blog tonight and you have some cool actions. I downloaded a few and am excited to try them out. Thanks.

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Thank you for taking the time to leave a message, I love reading them! All comments are personally moderated by me and I will post and answer them them as soon as possible.
Rita