Removing Color to Reveal Line Art Only Part One The focus of this tutorial is to describe how you can go about removing color from artwork to reveal the black line art only by using photo editing tools such as Adobe Photoshop or Affinity Photo (for Windows). My methodology is always evolving and | make no claim it is the definitive way of removing color from line art. There are likely several ways of achieving the same goal and | encourage you to experiment and find what works for you. There are probably dozens of similar tutorials on Youtube explaining the functionality of the various tools in both Adobe Photoshop and Affinity Photo. So if you want to get better at learning these powerful tools, please go to Youtube and give them a look.Since my color removal process makes references to certain concepts, | feel it important to introduce them early on in this tutorial. These concepts are introduced at a “high level” and a detailed examination is left for you to pursue at your own discretion. The first item to consider is Color Space. There is a RGB (Red, Green, Blue) Color Space and there is a CMYK (Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, Key/Black) Color Space.» In general, RGB (Red, Green and Blue) is the color space for digital images. * Constructs all the colors from a combination of Red, Green and Blue colors.— * The red, green and blue use 8 bits each, which have integer values from 0 to 255. This makes 256*256*256=16,777,216 possible colors. g» Afew RGB color combinations. Basic colors: Hex Code Decimal Code Color HTML/CSSName ypRagag (RGB) Ha = #000000 (0,00) « Take special note of White ‘#FFFFFF © (255,255,255) «—— Black and White. Red #FF0000 —(255,0,0) Lime #OOFFOO ——(0,255,0) Blue #OO00FF —(0,0,255)CMYK Color Space | | * In general, CMYK (Cyan, Magenta, Yellow, Key/Black) is the color space for printed materials. The CMYK coor model cyan (C) Magenta (M) Black (K) Standard black (the K in CMYK) is essentially Yellow (Y) e@ made from shades of grey.» Afew CMYK color combinations.. Blue charts - Code CMYK Color name Color preview Blue Aquamarine blue blue Clear blue azurin steel blue CMYK COLOR CODE (100%, 100%, 9%, 0%) (51%, 0%, 0%, 39%) (100%, 50%, 0%, 0%) (85%, 37%, 0%, 20%) (52%, 14%, 0%, 5%) (33%, 52%, 0%, 0%) (69%, 24%, 0%, 27%)For color removal purposes, it is important to know... The numeric value for Red (R), Green (G) or Blue (B) in the RGB Color Space can have a value from 0 to 255. The RGB value for Black is (0,0,0) and for White is (255,255,255). K (black) is comprised of greys in the CMYK Color Space. The CMYK value for Black is (0,0,0,100) and for White is (0,0,0,0).a This color removal technique works best with DIGITAL sources. Obviously, it will not work with painted artwork where there is little or no line art. Since | will be demonstrating how you can remove color from a comic book page, you can find many digital sources on the Internet such as: https://readcomiconline.|i/ or https://getcomics.info/ or on Usenet in newsgroups such as... alt.binaries.comics.dcpDigital Sources (con't.) = * The best digital material of comic book art are from reprints produced by companies like Marvel and DC. Examples: Marvel Masterworks, Omnibus editions, Marvel Visionaries, Absolute editions, etc. These compilations tend to be (but not always!) assembled from good quality photostats of the art and will render good quality line art when the color is removed. While a scan of a comic book published on newsprint is technically “digital”, it does not usually produce a good representation of the line art when the color is removed.Software You can use either Adobe Photoshop or Affinity Photo. Adobe Photoshop and Affinity Photo are competing products. Adobe Photoshop uses a subscription business model meaning you pay a subscription fee (either monthly or annually) to use the product. Affinity Photo is buy and own and much cheaper than PS. The procedure described here is Affinity Photo-centric since it is the tool | use for this type of work. But you can (for the most part) transfer what you learn here over to Adobe Photoshop. But | will demonstrate the Photoshop approach later in Part 3 of this tutorial.Macros | | The second concept and key to my process of using Affinity Photo to remove color is the use of macros. Macros in Affinity Photo are the same as Actions in Adobe Photoshop. Macros are simply a way of combining a set of instructions into a package or “macro”. You can launch a macro with a click of your mouse. If you notice you are performing the same set of instructions over and over again and applying them many times to the same image or group of images, consider creating a macro or several macros to save time. If you are using Affinity Photo, please download James Ritson’s “JR Channels Macros” at https://jamesritson.co.uk/resources.html. James Ritson is a Product Expert (Affinity Photo) for Serif Europe Ltd. -- the makers of Affinity Photo.— The James Ritson macros are free but you MUST enter “O” (zero — no quotes) in the price box else the “Add to cart” button will not work. ey © Enter “0” (zero — no JR Channels Macros (Affinity Photo) piv quotes) here. @ nse Container fo chanel menipiston nlngeestng “alata RG tn for eau sd ig on separ red ron aa tu layerInstalling a set of macros in Affinity Photo Installation Ge c > cay Nie esata ae eae ead Pea 7 r eet atta or eee uble c Tera seitFor color removal purposes, it is important to know... * Affinity Photo macros = Adobe Photoshop actions. Conceptually, they are the same thing but you cannot import Affinity Photo macros into Photoshop and you cannot import Adobe Photoshop actions into Affinity Photo. * Strongly recommended you download and install James Ritson’s “JR Channels Macros” and install them to Affinity Photo (assuming you are using Affinity Photo to remove colors from line art).