This method is very effective with designs that are bright, lively and contain distinct areas of colour. It enables you to pick up a colour with the Pipette Tool from an image and use the horizontal slider bars to control the amount of tone to be removed or manipulated.
It is an extremely powerful separation technique, but is specific to colours with hue, as opposed to black and white as these are shades and have no hue value. For this reason it is not a suitable method for separating black and white areas, or very dark or very light colours.
Surfaces
Instructions
- Make the image active and choose Separate Menu > Spot.
- Select Hue from the pop up menu and pipette a colour from the design using the Pipette Tool.
Note: If the Spot Window looks small like the one in the snapshot above, click the small button in the top right hand corner to expand it.
- Click ‘New’ and make sure that the Preview and Tonal buttons are ticked.
- Adjust the tone values using the three slider bars and then if more manipulation is required, try using the Gamma Curve.
- Hue – this slider is used to change the delta hue, so it removes the unwanted colours but keeps the tones you want included. The further this slider is pushed to the right, the more specific the colour range is to the selected colour.
- Boost – this slider is used to boost the chosen tones. This is similar to pushing the gamma curve upwards. For best results, use the boost slider first to enhance the tone range and then apply any gamma needed. This avoids unwanted step tones.
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Offset – this slider is used to alter the type of colour being picked up in the separation. If you are trying to separate a red colour in a design, some pink and orange may get picked up with it. If you only want the pink hues to be included, it is possible to separate the pinky-reds, without the orangey-reds, by offsetting the colour towards pink.
- Choose Fix when you are happy with the result and repeat these steps for any other colours to be separated.
Textiles
Instructions
- Make the image active and choose Separate Menu > Spot.
- Select Hue from the pop up menu and pipette a colour from the design using the Pipette Tool.
Note: If the Spot Window looks small like the one in the snapshot above, click the small button in the top right hand corner to expand it.
- Click ‘New’ and make sure that the Preview and Tonal buttons are ticked.
- Adjust the tone values using the three slider bars and then if more manipulation is required, try using the Gamma Curve.
- Hue - this slider is used to change the delta hue, so it removes the unwanted colours but keeps the tones you want included. The further this slider is pushed to the right, the more specific the colour range is to the selected colour.
- Boost - this slider is used to boost the chosen tones. This is similar to pushing the gamma curve upwards. For best results, use the boost slider first to enhance the tone range and then apply any gamma needed. This avoids unwanted step tones.
Offset - this slider is used to alter the type of colour being picked up in the separation. If you are trying to separate a red colour in a design, some pink and orange may get picked up with it. If you only want the pink hues to be included, it is possible to separate the pinky-reds, without the orangey-reds, by offsetting the colour towards pink.
Choose Fix when you are happy with the result and repeat these steps for any other colours to be separated.
Wallcoverings
Instructions
- Make the image active and choose Separate Menu > Spot.
- Select Hue from the pop up menu and pipette a colour from the design using the Pipette Tool.
Note: If the Spot Window looks small like the one in the snapshot above, click the small button in the top right hand corner to expand it.
- Click ‘New’ and make sure that the Preview and Tonal buttons are ticked.
- Adjust the tone values using the three slider bars and then if more manipulation is required, try using the Gamma Curve.
- Hue - this slider is used to change the delta hue, so it removes the unwanted colours but keeps the tones you want included. The further this slider is pushed to the right, the more specific the colour range is to the selected colour.
- Boost - this slider is used to boost the chosen tones. This is similar to pushing the gamma curve upwards. For best results, use the boost slider first to enhance the tone range and then apply any gamma needed. This avoids unwanted step tones.
Offset - this slider is used to alter the type of colour being picked up in the separation. If you are trying to separate a red colour in a design, some pink and orange may get picked up with it. If you only want the pink hues to be included, it is possible to separate the pinky-reds, without the orangey-reds, by offsetting the colour towards pink.
Choose Fix when you are happy with the result and repeat these steps for any other colours to be separated.