white background -> transparent background

[pit29]

Hi all,

I'm trying to change a white background of a figure to a transparent one. I'm using a color-based selection (sorry, but I don't know the exact name of the english menu items, but I guess you know what I mean...), and then hit delete to delete everything white. Then saving as a png. The problem is, that there is a small whitish border around black lines. Eventually, I want to insert the figure in a gradient background, so those white speckles should be gone, too. Clearly, they're coming from the anti-aliasing from the original jpeg.

I'm almost sure there must be a better way... Levels, masks? But I have no clue. I appreciate any tips!

Pit

 

[michael94043]

The resolution of photo may be to low and the mask can't get close enough to the image to loose all the white background

You can make a quick mask and paint out the background with a sharp or soft edge

or draw a path with the pen tool just inside the edge of the subject and convert to a selection and delete the background with a layer mask or just delete

Michael

 

[jbennardo]

As Michael suggested, for an accurate selection, I'd suggest drawing it with a pen tool.

If you get close using other methods you can try this:

Layer > Matting > Remove White Matte

This might help for those stray pixels you missed.

 

[jampat]

Hi all,

I'm trying to change a white background of a figure to a transparent one. I'm using a color-based selection (sorry, but I don't know the exact name of the english menu items, but I guess you know what I mean...), and then hit delete to delete everything white. Then saving as a png. The problem is, that there is a small whitish border around black lines. Eventually, I want to insert the figure in a gradient background, so those white speckles should be gone, too. Clearly, they're coming from the anti-aliasing from the original jpeg.

I'm almost sure there must be a better way... Levels, masks? But I have no clue. I appreciate any tips!

Pit

Either make the color selection include more of the greys or manually expand the selection to delete all of the grey (you will likely either have some black removed or some white left though depending on how much you expand your selection).

Alternatively, if you just have a B&W image, select and delete white as you did, then invert the selection and paint over everything with black to remove any remaining grey/white.