How pull back from BW adjustment with mask?

[kevs]

In PS with a BW adjustment layer, I pulled the blue slider to far left, great look, but I tried to paint into the mask to reduce the dark effect on  part of the file, and it PS  puts the color blue back in!

Is there a way to dial back in either PS or ACR?

[Jeffrey Saldinger]

If I understand your situation correctly, where you paint the mask with black (or gray) to diminish the effect of the customized BW adjustment, then what is happening is you’re also undoing the conversion from color to BW.

You can just copy the adjustment layer, invert the mask, and what had turned blue will revert to BW.  You can then work with the sliders on either adjustment layer to get the effect you want.

When I do this kind of two-layer work, I add a third BW adjustment (usually keeping the default slider values) to make sure that any parts of the image that haven’t been completely converted to "fully neutral" BW do get so converted.  This can happen, for example, where the brush has some softness to it.

[kevs]

Thanks Jefferey, looks promising.  Completely lost me here:

"and what had turned blue will revert to BW.  You can then work with the sliders on either adjustment layer to get the effect you want."

I did the copy layer, and inverted the mask to black, but then what?

The new layer has no effect as it's blocked by it's original below. So I still cannot paint back in the original lighter BW tones I that became dark.  Pulling sliders has no effect as well.

[Peano]

Just open a second BW adjustment layer above the first one, but don't adjust its sliders.

[kevs]

Thanks P, that had no effect. I 'll wait till someone post a video, or else I'll have 10 new layers soon, all of which don't do anything!

[Peano]

Thanks P, that had no effect.

Then your description of the problem isn't accurate, because I tried it, and it does work.

1. BW adjustment layer with blue slider pulled to -100.
2. Paint out part of that effect with black on the mask, which restores some blue.
3. Open a second BW adjustment layer above that one.
4. The restored blue is changed back to grayscale.

That's the effect. You must be doing something wrong.

[Jeffrey Saldinger]

Thanks Jefferey, looks promising.  Completely lost me here:

"and what had turned blue will revert to BW.  You can then work with the sliders on either adjustment layer to get the effect you want."

I did the copy layer, and inverted the mask to black, but then what?

The new layer has no effect as it's blocked by it's original below. So I still cannot paint back in the original lighter BW tones I that became dark.  Pulling sliders has no effect as well.

I can explain this another way.  My screenshot used Bill Atkinson's 14 balls test chart.  As you’ll see I didn’t do the sliders the way you did, but the idea is the same.

The first BW adjustment layer, with the blue slider to the right, effected the whole image before I painted the mask.  Where I wanted to “to reduce the dark effect on part of the file”, I painted black on the mask.  This turns the upper right ball back to blue.  When I duplicate that adjustment layer there is no effect, but when I inverted the mask, there was white where, on the 1st layer’s mask, there had been black.  This area of white on the 2nd layer’s mask will allow you go into color sliders and change the strength of the blue slider or, of course, any of the other sliders.

I think if you work through the steps the idea will be clear.  If you use a soft brush you will see why that third BW layer is necessary.  I used the default sliders, but you can vary them as you want to.

[kevs]

Peano: Got it much better. Thanks.

Jeffrey, can't follow that at all, maybe bullet numbers are better.

[Jeffrey Saldinger]

Jeffrey, can't follow that at all, maybe bullet numbers are better.

I’m sorry my last post wasn’t helpful, kevs.

When I went through it this morning, I noticed I had quoted your original post, where you wanted to “reduce the dark effect…”.  In my screenshot, I had lightened the effect, hence my “blue slider to the right”.  I hope that wasn’t confusing.  My error.  Other than that, I think reproducing the steps using my text and screenshot as a guide will demonstrate my approach.

One thing more: I see in your reply #2 above that when you inverted the mask, you said it went from white to black.  This suggests that you copied the 1st adjustment layer before you used black on it to mask the effect.  You’ll see in my screenshot that the 1st layer’s mask has black painted with a soft brush.  When I copy that layer and invert the mask, I get the mask on my second layer: black except for where I want to change the sliders.

I’ll look through my post later and if I find a better way to explain it I’ll post it.