Colorization Tips

Follow our colorization tips to start to be an expert in photo colorizing. These tips will help you learn how to add color to your black and white images, replace colors in color photos, and how to optimise your work using AKVIS Coloriage.

• When selecting a color take into account that the final result depends on the brightness of the original color.

  If you are not satisfied with the result you can make the final color lighter or darker. For this purpose you should change the brightness range of the selected color. Take into account that the brightness range compression (especially if it is strong) will inevitably result in deterioration of the detail and deepness of an image.

   

• Colorization will look natural if you select less saturated colors for your black and white photo.

   

• If you want to have a smooth color transition (i.e., when assigning several colors for the sky or for verdure), you should draw strokes far from each other; if you want to have a sharp color transition (i.e. when assigning colors for eyes, lips, etc.) you should draw strokes close to each other so that the colors won't flow.

   

• To remove strokes use the Eraser tool . The shortcut for the Eraser is the E key.

  If you want to remove an entire stroke, press the Alt key (Macintosh: Option) and left-click on this stroke.
  To remove all strokes press the keys Alt+Ctrl (Macintosh: Option+) and click on the picture.

   

• To change the color of a drawn stroke (or the brightness range for a drawn stroke), you should select a new color (or brightness range), activate the Tube tool and left-click the stroke.
  If you want to recolor several strokes having one color, you can activate the Magic Tube and click on one of such strokes - all the strokes having this color will be recolored.
  To recolor all strokes having the same color regardless of the brightness range, use the Magic Tube with the Ctrl-key pressed on the keyboard ( on Macintosh).

   

• To draw a straight line, activate the Pencil tool, press the Shift key and left-click on the start point of the line and on the finish point. In this way you can draw a polygonal outline.

   

• To color complex patterns and objects with clear boundaries activate the Multicolor tool. This saves time, because of instead of drawing many strokes, you can draw just one, which changes color according to the initial color field over which it passes.

   

• To be on the safe side we recommend you to always save the strokes you draw into a separate file.

  It is helpful if you have to interrupt your work before you set colors for every object or if you want to edit the colorized photo in the future (change the color scheme, edit strokes).
  To save the strokes you should press the button , to load strokes press the button .
  See an example of using the half-finished materials (strokes).

   

• Use hot keys for quick access to the tools: Pencil - the B key, Eraser - the E key, Eyedropper - the I-key, Tube - the G key.

   

• To regulate the brush size for the Pencil , Keep Color Pencil and Eraser tools use the drop-out scale that appears when you press the button of the corresponding tool.
  Use hot keys: to reduce the brush size press the key [, to increase the brush size press the key ].

   

• To change the image scale use the Navigator or the following hot keys: + and Ctrl++ (++ in Macintosh) to increase the scale, - and Ctrl+- (+- in Macintosh) to reduce the scale.

   

• If you want to cancel the last action with the button Undo or using hot keys Ctrl+Z (Macintosh: +Z).
  Restore the changes with the button Redo . The hot keys are Ctrl+Y (Macintosh: +Y).