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Photoshop Elements 3 & 4 - Tips and Tricks

8bit to 16bit conversion | Black and White conversion

8bit to 16bit Conversion

If you plan to extensively adjust the levels and colors of an 8bit image, it is a good idea to process it in 16bit mode. In this way you lose as little information as possible during manipulation.

From version 3, Photoshop Elements supports basic image editing in 16 bit mode. However, by default it is not possible to convert an image from 8bit mode to 16 bit mode.

There is a way to convert images to 16bit in Photoshop Elements 3: First of all you have to prepare a blank 16bit image. You can do it by importing an RAW image into Photoshop or other RAW converter. Then delete everything, resize it if needed and save it as Tiff of JPEG2000 in 16 bit format. It is probably a good idea to check that the 16bit image has the same color space as the 8bit images you plan to process.

Then you can do the following steps:

Open the 8bit image
Open the blank 16bit image. If needed resize it.
Copy the entire 8bit image and paste it into the 16bit image
Do your editing (levels, colors, filters etc) on the 16bit image
When done convert it back to 8bit an save it.

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Black and White Conversion

There is no channel mixer in Photoshop Elements. However, there is a quickly and intuitive way of converting color images to black and white: the "Adjust Hue/Saturation" tool. You can find it under 'Enhance -> Adjust Color' (or 'Ctrl-U').

Use the middle slider to de-saturate the image on the master channel. Then with 'Ctrl-1' to 'Ctrl-6' select one of the 6 color channels (red, yellow, green, cyan. blue, magenta). On each one you can adjust the luminosity and in this way simulate the effect of various colored filters. Below is an example. The yellows were brightened and all the other colors were darkened some degree. The result simulates an yellow filter.

Original Image

Desaturated Image

Desaturated with brightened yellows
bright yellow image

Here is one more tip:
In most landscapes darkening the blue and cyan will produce a nice dark sky that will contrast with the clouds. However pay attention to the noise. You should work on both blue and cyan channels and carefully correlate the luminosity values on both to minimise the noise highlighting. Generally, if you change the luminosity on only one channel with an extreme value you can make the noise more visible so it is a good idea too have have a look on the adjacent channels.

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