Quick ways to create "tonal range" masks ?

[lutz]

hello,
what would be the quickest way to create "tonal range masks" in photoline? ( Masks covering all the brights parts of the image or medium and dark parts?). I would be espcecially interested to use blurred versions of these as layer masks (as described for PWP here: http://www.ncplus.net/~birchbay/3tone3/ ... #Workflow1 ).

A second question would be, is there a way in Photoline to set the automask to select for tonal ranges instead for color ranges?

Thanks a lot in advance!

[Hoogo]

I would try it this way:
>Tool > Change channels > Intensity to Mask
> Switch to "edit mask mode". That's the button in the toolbar with the funny face and the brush.
> Tool > CLUT, Filter > Blur... now apply to the mask.

I'm not 100% sure what that subtract in the tutorial means, but if I understand it right it's just another way to play with the values, and clut will do fine.

[lutz]

hello Hoogo,

thanks a lot, for directing me to the "change channels" tool, I would have never found the interesting tools hidden there on my own. Probably, because I am still not very familiar with photoline I found it easier to use for the moment the following procedure:

Duplicate the image layer; convert to grayscale, and then modify with CLUT and gaussian blur working layers. These three layers then grouped together and this group converted to a Layer Mask with
> Layermask > "convert for previous"
This rather complicated construction has the advantage that it stays mostly editable.

However, I have also discovered a more convenient masking tool in the "Maskerade" plugin which quickly produces masks based on tonal values, colors, edges, saturation and which is relatively easy to use for such a complex tool (it allows inverting , blurring , and combining masks). The only disadvantage of "Maskerade" is, that it is a plugin. I have the impression that such a tool, built in into the Layer Mask/Working layer system of photoline (and thus scriptable and editable) would open up many new image editing opportunities.

http://www.simpelfilter.de/en/bildbearb ... e-tut.html

http://www.simpelfilter.de/en/bildbearb ... erade.html