Forum: Photoshop


Subject: How to Merge 2 alphas together?

igohigh opened this issue on Nov 20, 2002 ยท 11 posts


kruzr posted Thu, 21 November 2002 at 1:42 PM

Hi Igohigh, This is to try to explain how to use the "Screen Blend" layer method, that I described in my earlier post. Once you have both of your Alphas converted to RGB, & placed in the same image, on different layers, first activate the top layer, then you would choose the "Screen" blend method, by clicking on the little pull down arrow at the right of the normal display. There are several methods of blending each active layer. By choosing the "Screen" blend, your top & bottom Alpha with both show as one image, now you can flatten the layers. You may have to do a little moving of both Alpha layer images, to get them lined up correctly, before you convert to "Screen" mode. Bring the original colored image back into PhotoShop, make sure that both the color image & the Alpha image are the same pixel size, 640 by 480 or what ever. Activate the Alpha image, select the white area with the "Magic Wand" tool, and save the selection, to the other image. When you ask to save the selection, you'll get a window asking "destination & document", click the little arrow & the name of your color image will come up, choose that image & select OK. Now if you select the original colored image, go into the "Channels" tab, you'll see the new Alpha channel at the bottom of the list. With the new Alpha channel active, down at the bottom you'll see an icon for "Load channel as selection". Now when you select the RGB channel & go back into the "Layers" tab, you'll see your new Alpha channel selection visible, over the image. I hope this all makes sense to you, it works fine for me. Cinema1954 has described another great method for doing what you want to do. I don't know why I picked up my procedure, but it has always worked for me, & I'm comfortable with it I guess, so that's why I use it on some of my Alpha work. Which ever method you choose, I hope it works out well for you, & you have a good one . . . Mark.