7 Channels Palette
Used
for storing color, and alpha channels
Grouped with the Layers, and Paths palettes
In the default arrangement, this one will be in the group at the bottom of your column of palettes. If the Channels palette is hidden behind the Layers, or Paths palettes, click on its title tab to bring it to the front, or choose Window > Show Channels.
Default channels in the Channels palette will be red, green, and blue if you are in RGB mode, or cyan, magenta, yellow, and black if you are in CMYK color mode.
You can turn channels on or off by clicking the eye icon next to their thumbnail. Turn all the color channels on or off at once by clicking the composite RGB, or CMYK channel’s eye icon.
You can do some very interesting color corrections, and image manipulations by editing individual color channels, but this is for experienced users, only.
The main use which the rest of us will find for channels is for saving selections. If you have spent a long time creating a perfect selection of a difficult subject, you should always save it as an alpha channel in case you need to use it again.
Alpha channels are masks that are saved in the Channels palette with your image file. Selections saved as alpha channels can be edited in the same way as quick masks. You can use any of the painting tools to add to the mask with black, or remove it with white. Gray will create a partial selection.
You can create alpha channels with the gradient tools that will allow a gradual blend of selected areas into nonselected areas when the channel is loaded as a selection.
In the illustration below, you can see the shortcut keys for each channel, listed at the right side of the palette.
To save a selection as a channel, choose Select > Save Selection. Accept the default options, and click OK. You can also save a selection by clicking the Save Selection button at the bottom of the Channels palette.
Please note that this entire palettes section has been updated from a Photoshop 6 version (which was updated from a 5.5 version). Wherever the palette is essentially the same as it was in 6, I have continued to use the screen capture illustrations made using that version. So if you notice cosmetic discrepancies in the illustrations, that's why. In all instances where features were added or changed, I have made new screen captures.
The illustration below shows the Channels palette with numbers added at the bottom for ID purposes.
The numbered icons are
1) Load Selection; this will load the selected Alpha channel as a selection
outline
2) Save Selection; this will save the selection currently active in the
image as an Alpha channel
3) New Channel will create a new, empty Alpha channel
4) the Trash, or delete button.
Shown below, left is the Channels palette’s options menu.
The Channels Options selection (which is grayed out in the menu illustrations) leads to a dialog box shown at right below, that will allow you to choose a different color for the masking overlay that appears when the Alpha channel is activated at the same time as the image color channels. The default color is a transparent red, but you can pick any color to replace it. You can also change the transparency of the mask color (not of the mask itself), and choose if you want the color to appear on the masked or unmasked portion of the image.
If you choose Split Channels, you can generate new grayscale documents from each single color channel. Each new document will include the color letter for the channel from which it came (R for red, B for blue, etc.). Then you can use Merge Channels to stick them all back together (if you want). First you'll be asked what Mode you want so use. Then, in the next dialog, you can decide which channel will go where.
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