How do i make a photo grey except the eye color?

Question:This is called selective colorization.

sorry but you'll HAVE to download SOMETHING

The best program for this - in my opinion - is GIMP because it is so easy on GIMP!!!!

download GIMP for free from www.gimp.org

how to do it:

-open the photo
- copy the photo and open it again so you have two windows each with the same photo
on ONE of them:
-convert to grayscale by right clicking and saying mode> grayscale
-convert back to RGB by right clicking mode>RGB
on the OTHER one:
-open layers dialogue (ctrl+L)
- make a new layer
-copy the black and white photo onto the layer(this should make the color poto black and white)
- push the anchor button
-right click the layer in the layer dialogue and add a layer mask at white full opacity
-select the paintbrush tool and make sure the foreground is set to black. paint whatever you want to restore to original color
-if you make a mistake set the foreground to white and what you paint will become black and white again

Best Answer - Chosen by Asker: This is called selective colorization.

sorry but you'll HAVE to download SOMETHING

The best program for this - in my opinion - is GIMP because it is so easy on GIMP!!!!

download GIMP for free from www.gimp.org

how to do it:

-open the photo
- copy the photo and open it again so you have two windows each with the same photo
on ONE of them:
-convert to grayscale by right clicking and saying mode> grayscale
-convert back to RGB by right clicking mode>RGB
on the OTHER one:
-open layers dialogue (ctrl+L)
- make a new layer
-copy the black and white photo onto the layer(this should make the color poto black and white)
- push the anchor button
-right click the layer in the layer dialogue and add a layer mask at white full opacity
-select the paintbrush tool and make sure the foreground is set to black. paint whatever you want to restore to original color
-if you make a mistake set the foreground to white and what you paint will become black and white again

It is not a difficult job. You can retain color in a part of the image and desaturate the rest. There are two photoshop tutorials in the link below. Please see them.

And... Do blind people dream? What do they see?

edit:

Does nobody get this, Whats with all the thumbs down... did nobody see the 'Best of answers' on the main page?

How do I make a photo gray except the eye color?
Do blind people dream? What do they see?
How do you amend your taxes that you filed this year?

if you are using Photoshop, one of the many ways to do this is to have your image up (background), click on the 'adjustment layer' icon at the bottom of your layers palette & click on Hue/Saturation.
Desaturate the image by moving the Saturation slider all the way to the left (-100) & click OK.
Choose the brush tool & make sure the colour you're painting on the layer mask is black. Choose your opacity for the paintbrush (100% for full colour) & then paint where the eyes are. This will 'reveal' the eye colour of the background layer. If you wish to fix mistakes, change the paint colour to white & this will allow you to paint back some of the desaturated colour.

Have fun!

A easy way to do this, if you don't know how to use photoshop is to use http://www.picnik.com/, you just upload your image , then go to edit , and after that you go to create, and then you make the image black and white, and then you use the paint brush to select the areas you want in color. The paint brush is blue and is right above the cancel button .

Do a web search on "selective color".

As is true of many procedures in Photoshop, there are several ways of doing selective color. This is a quick and easy method.

First open your photo in PS of course.

Then go to Layer - Duplicate Layer

Click OK

Then go to Image - Adjustments - Hue / Saturation

Drag the Saturation slider all the way to the left to make the photo black and white.

Click OK

Then get the ERASER tool from the tool box on the left side of the screen. It is usually the next tool under the clone stamp tool. Just hover your mouse over the tool, and it will say Eraser.

When you have selected the Eraser, go up to the Brush options box at the top of the screen, and click on the downfacing arrow. Set the Hardness of the brush to 100% so you will have accurate control of selection. You may also need to raise or lower the brush size to suit.

Erase away any black and white from where you want the color to be revealed.

When done go to
Layer - Flatten Image

Then just do a Save As to wherever you want to save the photo.

hope this helps you

steve