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Digital Photography Tips, Tutorials and Resources
Digital Photography Tips, Tutorials and Resources
by Brenda Barron on May 13, 2023
Need to play around with the transparency of your latest image?
Making an image transparent – even partially, can give you endless ways to enhance your material. For instance, you can combine images to create something new for your customers or add a transparent image to a product for branding reasons.
The question for many beginners in the photo editing world, is how do you make an image transparent?
The simple answer is Photoshop.
If you don’t have it yet, you can get Photoshop here from Adobe’s site.
Photoshop is a popular image manipulation tool that allows you to add transparency to your photos in a range of different ways. Today, we’re going to look at three different ways you can add transparency to your pictures by discussing how to:
Let’s begin.
If you’re wondering how to make an image transparent for your portfolio, one easy option is to learn how to make layers transparent. When you make a layer transparent, you can add it to other images, or place it onto products without worrying about background edges and opacity. You can even use layers to touch-up your photos.
If you want to merge or combine pictures in your portfolio, then you might need to make parts of your layer transparent. To do this, you’ll need to select your layer again like above, but make sure that the layers underneath that image are transparent. Select the area you want to alter using the selection tool, then:
Maybe you want the focus of your image to be clear and opaque, but the background to be transparent so that you can combine pictures or move the subject of your image elsewhere. To do this, you’ll need to create a transparent background.
Once you place your image into the transparent background, you’ll be able to remove any edges or extra elements from the photo that you also want to be transparent. To do this, click on the Eraser tool or Magic Eraser tool on the left-hand side of the image. Drag the eraser over the areas that you want to make transparent.
Once you’ve learned how to make an image transparent in Photoshop, it’s important to make sure that you can use those images without them accidentally taking on a new background when you open the file. The key is to make sure that your layers don’t merge when you’re saving your Photoshop file.
When saving your new transparent photo, click on the Format drop-down menu and select the PNG option. Choose a location where you’ll be able to easily find your image and hit the Save button.
If you can’t see a PNG file option on your Photoshop documents, then you may be editing your image in the CMYK format, which means that you’ll need to convert it into the RGB mode, so you can save as a PNG file. Don’t save as JPG as this will eliminate all of your hard work.
There you have it – learning how to make an image transparent with Photoshop was probably much easier than you thought! Now you can use your transparent photos to create a stunning selection of pictures to add to your growing portfolio!
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Envira Gallery helps photographers create beautiful photo and video galleries in just a few clicks so that they can showcase and sell their work.
Picmonkey is still my go-to app though it offers limited features in the free version.
However, after Picmonkey I love Lightroom for its mult-editing features. Besides, its interface is simple and intuitive.
Thanks for adding this app on this list.
Muchas gracias por la ayuda… nos es muy util.
Gracias por la información… nos es de gran utilidad.
I appreciate you sharing the content. I agree with the critical point you highlighted regarding the Make Background Transparent in Photoshop guide. But I have a Read More blog that will clarify the situation.